Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Will I find something in there
To give me just what I need?
Another reason to bleed
One by one, hidden up my sleeve

All My Life by Foo Fighters

Act 1: The Bounty Hunter

Chapter 1: Another Reason to Bleed

A man dressed in black snuck down to the dock of Chin Village in the dead of night. There, another man awaited him beside a boat. “I’ve got what you asked for,” the first whispered, passing a small but heavy sack over.

The second man accepted the sack and peered inside. When he looked up, there was a triumphant edge to his smirk. “Excellent. Come aboard, Mr. Hao.” The two of them stepped inside the boat, the first man looking relieved and giddy.

Unbeknownst to them, they had an audience of one on a nearby roof.

Zuko quickly climbed down the side of the building furthest from them and ran towards the boat as it began to leave. He withdrew a pair of swords from their sheathes, leapt at the boat, and plunged his swords into the side. He crept along the side of the boat with the soundlessness he was renowned for, leaving a series of thin but deep punctures from his swords in his wake, and paused at each window to listen for voices. Finally, he settled below a window to an occupied room.

“…not as much as I’d hoped.” The voice was unfamiliar, presumably belonging to a third man. He spoke dangerously, with the air of someone who had too much power and too little self-control. Zuko should know. He’d spent his childhood in fear of a voice just like it. “You’re sure this was everything they had?”

“Positive, Mr. Chuong, sir,” Hao replied nervously.

“Then you won’t mind if one of my guards pats you down, hmm?” Chuong didn’t wait for an answer. “Shaoshir, if you would.”

“Of course, sir.” Amidst the sounds of muted footsteps and rustling fabrics, Zuko tensed. If Hao had squirreled away any of his stolen jewels and stashed them on his person, it might complicate his current mission. Luckily, the next thing he heard was, “All clear, sir.”

“Very well. My apologies for doubting your word, Hao, but in this line of work you can never be too careful. I’m sure you understand.”

“Absolutely.” Hao, in contrast to his client, spoke so gingerly in his anxiety that Zuko nearly pitied him. Then again, even someone like Chuong could be made to speak that way given the right pressue.

“Munu, please see Hao to his lodgings. We should reach our destination by tomorrow morning.”

Zuko heard a door open and close, and listened closely for voices, but heard none. He carefully weighed his options. Most likely, Munu and Hao were no longer in the room, but a man like Chuong would definitely have at least one guard with him at all times, probably two or three. On the other hand, the boat wasn’t so big since it was primarily used for illicit dealings. There couldn’t be room for more than six or seven passengers, and that included Munu, Hao, Chuong, and a captain. Munu and Hao had just left, and the captain would be on the bridge unless he had a message for Chuong, which, given the silence, he evidently did not. Zuko could strike now while it was almost certainly no more than four people in the room, or he could wait and hope more of them left before anyone new showed up.

The choice was obvious, but Zuko was not a patient person. Adjusting his grip on the hilts of his broadswords, Zuko pushed himself into the air, kicked through the window, and jumped into the room, yanking his swords out of the boat wall as he landed.

“The Blue Spirit!” one guard screamed. Zuko smirked behind his mask. He never got sick of hearing people shout his alias in terror.

He quickly took stock of the room – one man at a desk and two men at the only door – and lunged for the man at the desk. The guard who’d screamed flinched backwards as he moved, but the other darted between him and the desk. Zuko ducked beneath the swipe of their blade and somersaulted into their legs, knocking them over as he shot upright behind them.

With nothing between him and his goal, he pulled the man at the desk to his feet and crossed his swords on the other side of the man’s neck. “Chuong?” he hissed.

“Yes,” the man confirmed, and Zuko had to admit he sounded impressively composed. Too bad he could feel Chuong shaking. “Your reputation precedes you, Blue Spirit, but I’m not sure what I did to warrant your presence on my boat. I am not a wanted man.”

“No, but you did pay a wanted man to commit a crime in your name," Zuko taunted, drawing an inordinate amount of satisfaction from Chuong's evident distress. In a line of work that relied primarily on caution and patience, Zuko indulged without remorse in what few pleasures it allowed him. "I doubt the authorities would be displeased if I brought you and your stolen goods in.”

“How much will they pay you?” Chuong asked. There it was: the voice of a powerful man in a helpless situation, just as nervous as Hao had sounded minutes earlier. “Five gold pieces? Six? With just three of the jewels Hao stole, I guarantee you could make at least twelve gold. I could be persuaded to part with so many.”

He couldn’t deny that it was a tempting deal, but he didn’t have enough honor left to spend on negotiations with petty criminals Even if he did, Chuong was not the kind of person Zuko could ever stomach working with; the man was practically dripping with sleaze, and Zuko had heard plenty from his professional contacts about how Chuong made most of his money and what he did with that money. “Not interested. If you want to live, you’ll come with me to the bridge and tell your captain to turn the boat around, and then you’ll pack up the jewels and hand them over to me along with Hao.”

Chuong sighed heavily. “I suppose I have no choice. Guards, let us through.” Zuko tried not to feel so disappointed by the easy submission. Less fighting is good, he reminded himself, ignoring the part of him that was itching to beat Chuong into submission instead. If you don't fight, you can't be hurt or killed. That's a good thing.

The guards stepped aside, and Zuko allowed Chuong to lead him to the bridge. “Captain, there is a slight problem. I must ask you to return to the dock.”

“Why - ?” The captain turned around, took one look at them, and paled. “Yes, sir.”

Next, Chuong led him back to his own lodgings, where Zuko instructed the guards to stay within his line of sight as Chuong placed twelve jewels in a sack. Finally they approached the dock. Chuong tied the sack to Zuko’s belt, and the guards held Hao down while Chuong tied his wrists up. Zuko released him and swiftly evacuated the vessel, throwing Hao over his shoulder. He took a millisecond to look at Chuong and commit his features to his memory before making a run for it. “Please don’t do this,” Hao begged, practically on the verge of tears. “I was – I was going to donate it all! I swear I was!”

“Save it for someone who cares,” Zuko grunted.

“Have a heart, Mr. Blue Spirit,” Hao wailed. “Children will go hungry without the money from these jewels – “

“If you were such a good person, maybe you wouldn’t have murdered two innocent people to get to these jewels.”

Hao fell silent.

They arrived at the town authorities’ headquarters close to dawn, and Zuko triumphantly dropped Hao in the doorway. “Blue!” one guard cheered, a woman named Wishi. “The night shift told me you’d stopped by, but I knew you wouldn’t leave without saying hello. And look! You brought me presents!” She winked at him. “So polite.” She rose from her desk and lifted Hao to his feet. “Hao, you are under arrest for the murder of Raonoh and Lang.” She dragged him over to a jail cell.

Zuko untied the sack of jewels and handed it to her. “Wishi, could we discuss the case in private? I discovered some delicate information that you may find useful.”

Wishi nodded seriously as she took the jewels from him. “Of course. Paoshu, could you take the jewels to the back and send for the daughter, Haki?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She passed the bag on to another guard and escorted Zuko to her office. “What happened?” she asked.

“I’ve got an anonymous tip on Chuong.”

“What?!”

Zuko grinned under his mask at the open jubilation on her face. “He hired Hao to get the jewels in exchange for an illegal trip – where to, I’m not sure, but I am sure Hao will tell you with very little negotiation. Not much spine to that one.”

“So Chuong confessed?” Wishi pressed.

“Even better. He confessed, and then he tried to bribe me into letting him keep the jewels.”

“Did you see his face?”

“Of course.” She set a scroll, a quill, and ink on the table. “Narrow eyes, round nose, thin lips, short chin, heart-shaped face, and a nasty-looking scar across his right cheek.”

She scribbled vigorously as he spoke, and when he finished, she looked up at him with the widest smile he’d ever seen on her face. “Finally. Finally we can start putting up wanted posters with an actual face on them! Blue, thank you so much for this. I don’t know how I can repay you.”

“Well, you can give me Hao’s bounty.”

She laughed good-naturedly and retrieved three gold pieces from a jar on the desk. “I wish I could give you more, but unfortunately, anonymous tips don’t get rewarded.”

Zuko shrugged, accepting the gold with a bittersweet grimace as he remembered Chuong’s offer. “I’ll be okay, Wishi. By the way, I have two more names for you – Shaoshir and Munu. I believe they work for Chuong as his guards. There was a third man, but I didn’t catch his name, and I didn’t get a good look at any of them.”

“You’ve done more than enough, Blue,” Wishi insisted.

"For someone as ruthless as you described him to be," Zuko said absently as they rose from their seats, "he didn't put up much of a fight, and neither did his guards. It was almost a letdown."

"That death wish of yours is going to get you killed someday," Wishi joked.

Isn't that the point of a death wish? Zuko thought dryly, but had long since learned better than to voice. Out loud, he replied, "Not with all my targets rolling over as soon as they see me."

"Let a few 'escape,'" Wishi suggested with a conspiratorial nudge. "Maybe they'll start trying to kill you again."

As soon as they exited the office, a red-eyed young woman rushed towards Blue. “Thank you for catching him.”

Zuko frowned. “Haki, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

She looked so young, Zuko could hardly believe she was a year older than him. Then again, he’d lost both of his parents almost three years ago, albeit in very different ways, and she was only just losing hers now. “I’m very sorry for your loss, Haki.”

“I’m just glad my parents’ murderer will face justice,” she replied, but her heart wasn’t in it. Zuko almost asked if she had anyone to help her grieve and adjust, but decided against it. There was no point; the well-being of victims' families was, as he had learned early on, a senseless thing to emotionally invest in. They would be okay, or they would not be okay, and there was virtually nothing he could do about it one way or the other. Instead, he gave her a short nod and strode out of the building.

Zuko rode his ostrich horse to the nearest marketplace. As he tied it up and went in search of food, he was surprised by the lack of awed and frightened glances that his mask usually earned him in public. Everyone was whispering, but not, seemingly, about him. “What’s got everyone so talkative today?” he asked a fish merchant as he examined the merchandise.

The merchant scowled. “The Avatar is on Kyoshi Island.”

A trout slipped from Zuko’s grasp as his heart pounded in his ears. “What did you say?”

“The Avatar,” the merchant repeated, looking thoroughly disgruntled. “He’s back. And he’s on Kyoshi.”

For a split second Zuko wondered how he could sound so unenthusiastic about the Avatar’s return, but then he remembered that he was in Chin Village, possibly the only place in the Earth Kingdom where the civilians would rather the Avatar didn’t return. “Huh,” he said numbly.

“Are you gonna buy something or what?” the merchant grumbled at him, and Zuko realized he’d been standing there doing nothing a bit too long.

He picked up two trout and held them up in response.

“That’ll be two silver pieces.”

Zuko reached into his pouch and pulled the money out. As he wandered through the merchants' stalls collecting some fruit and a few bags of feed, he tried to come to terms with this new information. The Avatar was back. If he were being honest, he hadn’t thought the Avatar was ever coming back. Though he’d hoped beyond hope, had dreamt of it almost every night, had thought about it more than anything else, at some point he’d finally registered that he was never going home. But if the Avatar was alive, then there was hope – real hope.

He had to get to Kyoshi Island.

The next day, Zuko went to sea with his boat, a glorified scrap of wood with just enough room for himself, his ostrich horse, and a bound prisoner or two. With any luck, the Avatar would be accompanying him in that capacity before long. He paddled his way to the edge of the forest, hoping to be spotted by as few people as possible. The people of this village had been very suspicious of him thanks to his reluctance to remove his mask when he’d visited on-the-job two and a half years ago, and besides, the arrival of a bounty hunter so soon after the arrival of the Avatar was certain to be treated with suspicion. He and his pet left the boat, and he quickly finished off the food he’d purchased the day before, gave the ostrich horse a bit of feed, and tied him to the same tree he’d tied the boat to. He’d be back before the end of the night.

Before then, however, he had to capture the Avatar. He wouldn’t have a lot of time; Kyoshi Island was small, and someone would certainly stumble upon him if he lingered. The Kyoshi Warriors would probably protect this new Avatar with their lives in honor of their namesake, so unless he wanted a kill count attributed to his alias, he had to catch the new Avatar when they were alone. Somehow. Zuko resisted the urge to bang his head against a tree. He was closer to going home than ever before, and yet in some ways he felt no closer than he had been the day before. Sure, he knew the general location of the Avatar, but he had no way of getting a more specific location, no way of cornering them by themselves, and no way of capturing them.

Zuko took a deep breath and mentally stepped back, becoming aware that he was overthinking the situation. I just have to treat this like a normal case, he decided. That was admittedly easier said than done; normally he would ask the authorities for more information first, but for once the authorities weren’t on his side, because he was capturing the Avatar, not a wanted criminal with a bounty on their head. Then again, the Avatar wouldn’t be hiding, either. They were a hero to this village, and that was a point in Zuko's favor; anyone would probably know where they were. The only question was how to get anyone to tell him.

With a sigh, he reluctantly removed his mask. He would have to question them without his mask, posing as an insignificant traveler who happened to be passing through. He always felt terribly vulnerable when he had to remove it for one reason or another, but it would be worth it to finally capture the Avatar, restore his honor, and go home as a prince.

Zuko made his way through the trees to the nearest dock and went from there to the town so as to look less suspicious. Once there, it was pretty easy to tell where the Avatar was; he followed the sounds of vapid giggling to a throng of young, enthralled children. At their core was a boy much older than them clad in bright yellow and orange, and even more noticeably, holding his hands out before him as a series of marbles chased each other in a circle between them, touching nothing but the air around them. Zuko froze, staring at the boy. He looked to be barely a teen, if that, yet he was most certainly airbending, and Zuko could think of no one other than the Avatar who might be capable of that. He was struck by the sudden, violent urge to take the Avatar then and there, but quickly silenced it. He had waited three years for his chance. He could at least wait until sunset, when the children would surely be recalled to their respective homes.

After allowing himself a few seconds to take in everything he saw that could be of use, he busied himself with a nearby merchant. He’d used up the last of his food that day, and with any luck, he’d need enough to last him a few weeks’ travel – he didn’t plan on letting the Avatar out of his sight until they got to the Fire Nation, and he didn’t plan on letting him off the boat either, which meant he would be confining himself as well and no shopping would get done. Crescent Island would be the best place to take him; of everyone who could take him and the Avatar to the Fire Lord, the Fire Sages were the best choice, as they were honorable and the least likely to try and take credit for the capture from him. Crescent Island was pretty close, too, only a week’s travel.

The merchant he’d stopped at smiled kindly. “We don’t often get strangers out here,” she commented. “You here to see the Avatar?”

Zuko nodded. “When I heard he was back, I… wanted to see for myself. I can hardly believe it.” He hesitated. “He’s... much younger than I expected,” he pressed, hoping she would give him more information if prompted.

He was rewarded. “Yes, he is, poor dear.” She frowned. “Only thirteen, but he’s so polite, and so sweet. He has no idea about the war, either.” Zuko’s eyes widened as she shook her head. “This world is going to chew him up and spit him out.” Zuko glanced back at him. The Avatar had a large grin on his face, clearly pleased with the attention he was receiving. She was absolutely right, and Zuko was part of the reason why. But he hadn’t survived as long as he had by giving in to his guilt. “Anyway, what are you looking for?” Zuko jerked his attention back to her and selected enough fish to last him and the Avatar a week and a half, just to be safe. “You got a long trip ahead of you, or a large family to feed?”

“Trip,” he replied quietly. He paid for the fish and went on to purchase some fruit and an extra bag of feed. He took a quick look at his money pouch and inwardly cursed. He didn’t have much left. If something happened and they ran out of food before they reached their destination, he may very well need to stop to take on another hunting job, or else resort to theft. When he was first banished he’d had an easy time stealing from others because it was for his mother, too, and because as Fire Nation royalty he’d felt somewhat entitled. The past three years had thoroughly humbled him, however, especially when his mother died. Now, he would do almost anything to avoid stealing again.

As he shopped, he kept an eye on the Avatar, taking care not to stray too far from him. Though the Avatar himself didn’t seem too worried about his surroundings, a closer look revealed one of the Kyoshi Warriors watching him from the shadows. It was difficult to tell through the makeup, but Zuko thought he might recognize her as Suki, a warrior who had been particularly aggressive in his dislike for him two and a half years ago. She couldn’t possible recognize him without his mask, but he felt himself instinctively shying from going near her regardless. Their last meeting had been none too pleasant for him (though he'd like to think it had been equally unpleasant for her) and he would rather not find out if she'd improved as much as him in the time since. Plus, she was another unhelpful variable in his current mission.

Once he’d finished shopping, he made small talk with a few of the merchants about the state of the war and the local goings-on. The latter was a boring topic, which was typical of such a small village, but it was an easy enough excuse to keep the Avatar within his line of sight. Finally, the children began complaining of boredom, and the Avatar quickly appeased them. “I’ve got something else to show you!” he chirped. Zuko cringed at the cheerful innocence in his voice. “Come on, this way!” He pocketed the marbles and began to walk away.

The Kyoshi Warrior stepped out of the shadows. Whether she really was Suki or not, he had to do something to prevent her from following the Avatar. He approached a crowded vendor and slipped an apple into his pocket – there weren’t any apple trees on Kyoshi, which made apples a more valuable commodity whose absence was more likely to be noticed. Then he planted the apple in someone else’s basket and approached the Kyoshi Warrior. “Excuse me, ma’am?”

She paused in her calm pursuit of the Avatar and his fans. “Yes?”

“I’m, uh,” he scratched the back of his head, smiling sheepishly at her, “not from around here, but the Kyoshi Warriors are the guards, right?”

Her gaze sharpened. “Yes, we do. Why? Did you see suspicious activity?”

Yep, that’s Suki. “Well, I’m not – I’m not sure, but I think I might have seen someone back there steal an apple…. Sorry, I guess that’s a silly reason to bother you. It’s just fruit.”

“Apples are rare here on Kyoshi Island, so that isn’t so silly. Who was it?” Zuko gestured to the man. “Okay. Thank you for informing me. I’ll take care of it.”

Zuko nodded and backed away to watch her from a distance out of the corner of his eye while he busied himself with browsing a nearby stall. She hesitated, looking around, probably for another Kyoshi Warrior, and when she found none, she bounded towards the migrating Avatar to have a quick word with him before approaching the man. She would certainly follow the Avatar to his destination as soon as she was finished, which meant he had a very limited time frame in which to retrieve his mask and apprehend the Avatar. He silently followed the Avatar’s entourage from a distance until they reached a beach, which was clearly the destination. From there, he made his way back to his boat, where he fed his ostrich horse again and equipped his mask and swords. Then he crept back into the woods in the direction of the beach.

As he crept nearer, he watched in disbelief as what looked like the last of the children trailed down the path back to town as the Avatar swam sullenly through the water back to the beach. Looks like I won't be waiting for sunset after all. Zuko’s timing couldn’t have been more perfect. He waited patiently in the woods as the Avatar returned to shore, and as he made his way to the path Zuko struck, pinning two swords to his neck just as he’d done with Chuong. To his credit, the Avatar didn’t react, other than a small inhalation and tensing muscles. “Not a sound, Avatar,” he whispered, and felt more than saw the other boy give a slight nod, seeming to deflate. “You’re coming with me.”

He led the Avatar back to his boat, then removed one of the swords to pull his rope out of a satchel on the ground. He knelt slowly, careful to give the Avatar just enough room for him to kneel as well without him getting cut on the sword or escaping from it. He pushed the Avatar forward with his free hand, and slid the sword out from under him as he hit the floor. Then he pressed him down with one foot while tying his hands up. Finally, he sat back, and let him sit up. The absolute misery in the other boy’s eyes made his chest constrict.

“Sorry,” Zuko said, and the word sounded so hollow that he didn’t even know where to begin embellishing. “I – I don’t want to do this. It’s not your fault that you’re the Avatar. You don’t deserve this. I heard in town that you don’t even know the first thing about the war.”

“No, not really,” the teen confirmed. “I – I guess I sort of… slept through the past hundred years. I woke up in an iceberg a few weeks ago.”

“An iceberg.”

He cracked a grin, somehow finding a way to be amused despite his desperate situation. “A couple of older kids in the Southern Water Tribe found me and broke me out.”

“The Water Tribe?” Zuko frowned. “Where are they now? Are they here on the island with you?”

“Nah.” The grin faded a little. “They – I – I put their tribe in danger, so... they... kicked me out.”

Zuko’s jaw tensed. "They sent you off into the war? Alone?" It was too familiar a story. He wrestled with his rising sympathies; they couldn't help anyone, but that made them no easier to defeat.

“Well, there are a lot of kids who are a lot younger than me in their tribe. They have to look after their own. I understand. Only one of them kicked me out. The other wanted to come with me to the Northern Water Tribe, but I told her to stay. It’s safer for her there.”

“So…, who are you here with?” Zuko asked, dreading the answer.

“Oh, uh..., no one. Suki, I guess. She’s one of the Kyoshi Warriors. She’s really nice. I mean, it’s probably only because I’m the Avatar, but I still appreciate it.”

Zuko sighed, taking a seat on the wooden floor across from his captive. “I know what you mean, about people liking you for something someone else did. Where I come from, I was pretty important to people, but it was because of who my father was, not because of me.”

“I guess that’s one thing that hasn’t changed, then.” The boy smiled suddenly. “By the way, I’m Aang.”

“…Oh.” Zuko stared dumbly for a few seconds, caught off-guard, before composing himself. “Most call me the Blue Spirit.”

“Nice to meet you, Blue Spirit. Can I call you Blue? ‘Blue Spirit’ is a bit of a mouthful, and it feels oddly formal, y’know?”

“Blue is fine,” Zuko answered.

Aang smiled wider. He seemed oddly determined to make friends for someone who was tied up on a boat to be delivered to someone who would probably keep him imprisoned for the rest of his life. “So I guess you’re from the Fire Nation, huh?”

“Not really,” he replied honestly. He sighed in frustration, running a hand through his hair. “This isn’t even about the stupid war. I just want to go home. And I can’t – well, I’m not allowed to go home unless I capture you.”

“Oh!” Aang tilted his head at him. “So your… your family sent you to capture me? Wow, that was fast.”

Zuko shook his head. “I’ve been looking for you for three years.”

Aang’s jaw dropped. “Wait. You haven’t been home in three years? And you’ve been looking for me for three years? But I only just got out of that iceberg! I was in there for a hundred years!”

“I’m not sure I was really supposed to find you, to be honest,” Zuko admitted. “I was kicked out like you. My father said I could only come back if I found you.”

“Wow, that’s harsh. Are you sure you even want to go back? Your father sounds awful, and I’m not just saying that to get you to let me go.”

Against his better judgment, Zuko found that he actually believed him. Not that it changed anything. “I have to go back. It's complicated, but I have to. Besides, family is family, and I don’t….”

He trailed off, but Aang nodded understandingly. “You don’t have anyone else, huh?”

Zuko shook his head wordlessly. Aang opened his mouth to say something else, but their conversation was cut short when Zuko’s eyes caught something horrifying in the distance. “Oh no.”

Aang blinked at him. “What is it?”

“A Fire Nation war ship,” Zuko breathed, scrambling to his feet. “We have to go, now.”

“Wait – a war ship - ?” Aang pushed himself to his feet as well with airbending as Zuko tied everything down securely and picked up his paddle. “They’ll leave if I’m not there, right?”

Zuko froze.

“Blue?” Aang’s eyes widened. “Blue, what will they do if I’m not there?”

“…They’ll destroy the village,” Zuko muttered reluctantly. “They won’t believe it. They’ll burn the whole village to the ground before they believe it.”

Aang’s gaze filled with horror. “What if they see us leave?”

“On this thing? We’d have to get much closer before they noticed us, and they’d probably already be in the village by then.”

“I bet they’d notice a sky bison!” Aang exclaimed. “My bison, Appa, he’s huge, and he can fly. He’s just across town – if you bring me to him, I can get him to go fly around. And only an Airbender could tame a sky bison, so they’d have to know it was me, right?”

“I couldn’t bring you across town without being caught.”

“What do you – oh. By the Kyoshi Warriors, you mean.” Aang deflated.

Zuko stared blankly at the warship rapidly approaching land. He couldn’t believe it. He had been so close, so close, and yet… an entire village… no, there was no question. He couldn’t let an entire village pay the price for his loss of honor. That was too much. He turned back to Aang, his one and only chance at redemption. “Turn around.”

Aang looked up at him, the dismay in his eyes slowly but steadily turning to hope. “Are you…?”

“Turn around.”

He eagerly obeyed, and with a heavy heart, Zuko untied the ropes. “This isn’t over.”

“You’re letting me go?” Aang squeaked. While Aang was distracted, Zuko cut a small piece of cloth from his tunic as well and pocketed it.

“I will catch you,” Zuko asserted. He backed away. “But today, yeah, I’m letting you go.” His jaw tightened. “If they catch you, they aren’t going to treat you well. I could have some say in the way you’re treated once you reach the Fire Nation, but only if I’m the one to bring you there. Be careful.”

“I won’t get caught, Blue,” Aang promised. “Thank you.” With that, he was off.

Zuko watched him vanish into the forest with speed befitting an Airbender. He picked up his paddle and began heading back to Chin Village, thinking of the cloth in his pocket. It was high time he visited an old rival.

Chapter Text

When there's nowhere else to run
Is there room for one more son?
These changes ain't changing me
The cold-hearted boy I used to be

All These Things That I've Done by The Killers

Act 1: The Bounty Hunter

Chapter 2: Nowhere Else to Run

Just over a week after his first encounter with the Avatar, Zuko wore his mask and his swords to a shady bar just outside Omashu and sat down right next to a potential ally. Of course, his hope for her to become his ally diminished substantially when she reacted to his arrival by stabbing a knife into the bar between his fingers. “What do you want?” she snarled at him.

“Back off, June,” Blue replied tersely. “I’m here to negotiate.”

June leaned back in her barstool, scowling skeptically at him. “How much are you offering?”

“Not ‘how much,’ but ‘what.’” Before she could question him again, Zuko pulled the cloth he’d cut from Aang’s tunic and placed it on the table. “This belongs to the Avatar.”

June’s jaw dropped. “Damn, Blue, you work fast.”

It was more a case of being in the right place at the right time, but she didn’t need to know that. “It would be a lot easier with your help, and more specifically, Nyla’s. At the same time, you don’t have any way of tracking him without my help either. We may as well work together and split the reward.”

“Hmm. Or, I could kill you, take the cloth, and find and capture him myself.”

“Could you?”

Zuko watched in silence as she eyed him warily. After a few seconds, her gaze widened minutely, and she sniffed the air. “Damn it. Perfume.”

“You really think I’d come without it?” Zuko laughed at her. “I would rather not get in a fight with your shirshu. I’m more attached to my life than I am to my masculinity.”

“Always did like that about you,” June purred. “Fine, then. When are we leaving?”

“Tomorrow. Let me arrange for a weeks’ safe keeping for my ostrich horse tomorrow morning and we’ll meet back here to begin our search for the Avatar.”

Their first stop was Omashu. Zuko was worried they’d have to go hunting the Avatar through the city, which would be difficult since the Earth Kingdom guards wouldn’t give him up without a fight. However, June's shirshu Nyla caught Aang’s scent leaving Omashu, too, so they followed it from Omashu to a mining village just outside of a military fortress, which was possibly even worse. Zuko and June left Nyla tied up somewhere and made their way to the outskirts of the village. As a villager wandered too close to them, they came at him from either side and pinned him to a tree. “Seen the Avatar lately?” June inquired sweetly.

“N-N-N – “ The villager swallowed harshly and looked down. “…Yes. He passed through here a few days ago with a Kyoshi Warrior named Suki.”

June cursed. “Damn it, one of them.” She exchanged glances with Zuko. “That complicates things.”

Zuko focused on the villager. “Did they say where they were going next?” The man shook his head vigorously, and Zuko yanked him forward before slamming him against the tree again while drawing his sword. “Are you sure about that?”

“Yes!” the villager cried. “Please, I swear I’m telling you the truth, I have no idea where they were going! I didn’t even speak to them! The two of them freed our Earthbenders from the Fire Nation soldiers who were using them for slave labor. That’s all I know! Really, it is!”

“This guy’s a coward,” June muttered. “If he knew more than that, he’d tell us.”

Zuko scowled and released the villager, letting him scramble back to the village. “Let’s get out of here before he tells anyone.”

They got back onto Nyla and followed the Avatar’s scent through a forest that had been burned down to a bordering town. “I’ve got an idea,” Blue declared as they left Nyla tied up somewhere again.

June waited a few seconds, then glared at him. “Well? You gonna share with the class?”

“Just follow my lead.”

Zuko strode off to the town, ignoring June’s griping as she begrudgingly plodded after him. The villagers looked at him in alarm as he approached the village leader. “Have you seen a teenage girl from Kyoshi Island with short brown hair, about this tall?” he demanded urgently, raising his hand to Suki’s height.

The leader took in Zuko’s appearance and his expression darkened. “Yes. Why?”

“She’s wanted back on Kyoshi,” Blue explained. “She defected from the Kyoshi Warriors. The leader of her village informed me that she deceived the Avatar into traveling with her and hired me to catch her and bring her to justice.”

“I see,” the village leader said gravely. “I had no idea. She and the Avatar were here earlier today, but I’m afraid they are long gone now – they left for Crescent Island.”

Zuko stared at him in disbelief. His target had wandered right into the Fire Nation. On the one hand, if he could catch the Avatar on Crescent Island, it would save him the trouble of transporting him there safely. On the other hand, without his mask on, Zuko absolutely could not enter the Fire Nation. He didn’t want to know what the Fire Lord would do to him if he did. He glanced at June on his side. The Blue Spirit could not be deterred from his prey by enemy borders. Zuko would just have to not get caught. “Thank you for telling me. I’ll make sure the Avatar gets away from the Warrior safely, don’t worry.”

Zuko and June left the town and returned to Nyla. “What now?” June asked.

“I have a boat back at Gaoling, but by the time we got there and then to Crescent Island, I’m sure the Avatar and his escort would be long gone.” Zuko growled in frustration. “Do you have any nearby contacts in the Fire Nation? Someone who could get us a ride there?”

“No one nearby owes me that badly.” June rubbed her chin thoughtfully. “But…. I know someone who could get us the Fire Nation patrol schedule….”

Zuko’s stomach dropped. “And then we just have to smuggle ourselves onto a ship and smuggle ourselves off of it.”

“Exactly.” She flashed him a daring smirk. “Scared?”

“Not a chance,” he bluffed smoothly. “Just wondering if you can keep up.”

She tossed her head back and laughed. “I can take care of myself, Blue. You worry about you.”

They rode Nyla to another shady bar, where June left him to watch her, went inside, and returned with the information they needed. From there, they went to the nearest harbor, where a war ship bound for Crescent Island was parked as its crew gathered supplies. “You wanna take your mask off, maybe, and draw a little less attention?”

Zuko chuckled darkly. “You’ve never seen my face. Trust me, I’ll draw more attention without the mask.”

June gave him a strange look and shrugged. “If you say so. I hope you’ve got a plan. I’ll meet you on board.” With that, she sashayed towards a Fire Nation soldier.

Zuko glared at her as she left. Somehow she always rubbed him the wrong way. He couldn’t wait to be done working with her, but for now, he had to focus on the current objective; finding the Avatar. To do that, he first had to find a way onto that boat. Luckily for him, he was intimately aware of how those ships worked. It wouldn’t be the first time his origins were an ace up his sleeve instead of a curse. If he could get his hands on some blasting jelly, he knew exactly where to use just a little bit of it to blow the right size hole in the ship where no one was likely to notice it. It’d make quite a noise though. He’d have to do it while no one was on the ship – so he’d have to do it before they returned to the ship, which could be anywhere from a few minutes to over an hour away. He’d have to hurry. And though he would never tell her so, June was right; if he could avoid letting the Fire Nation know that the Blue Spirit was in the area, he really, really should.

He went to a secluded part of the dock and settled on the edge of the dock. He would make too much noise splashing around in the water if he tried to hang onto the dock and slide along the edge, so he’d have to press himself to the bottom of the dock instead, staying above water. He took off his shoes, pulled two hiltless daggers out of a small sheath not dissimilar to the one he kept his favorite knife in (a memento from his late uncle), and then he put a dagger into each shoe, pushing the blade through the heel so that it stuck out just a bit. He carefully put his shoes back on, his heels pressing down on the backs of the daggers, and braced himself. Agni, he hated this part. He slowly lowered himself into the water, adjusting the way his hands gripped the dock so that his arms were over his head. Then he swung back and kicked the daggers in his shoes into the bottom of the dock, steadying himself and holding himself in the air just inches above the water. He inched sideways until he heard a familiar voice, and then he pulled himself back onto the dock, right behind his favorite vendor. He let himself in through the back. “Hey, Oh,” he greeted the green-clad pirate manning the store.

Oh grinned sharply at him. “Blue! So good of you to stop by. I suppose it’s too much to ask that you come in through the front, and, I don’t know, dry.” He gestured to Zuko’s sopping clothes.

“You know I don’t like the Fire Nation,” Blue replied mildly. Most of his recurring associates did know that. It wasn’t uncommon enough to be dangerous knowledge; almost everyone who wasn’t Fire Nation would rather avoid them whether they were wanted or not.

“Fair enough,” Oh conceded. “What are you here for today?”

“The usual.” Zuko had found blasting jelly to be a near-necessity for him in order to maintain the guise of not being Fire Nation himself. Hiding his bending all the time was exhausting.

Oh ducked behind his counter and retrieved a large jar of blasting jelly. “How much?”

“Twenty-five grams.”

“Aw, that little? Fine. Five silver.”

“Five - ?”

“But!" Oh inched backwards, eyes trained on Zuko's swords though his smile didn't falter. "For my favorite customer, three.”

“Fine.”

Moments later, Zuko clung to the underside of the dock at a safe distance from the warship, most of the blasting jelly spread over a roughly Zuko-sized space on said ship while the leftovers were tucked away on Zuko's person. Then he proceeded to set it off from afar with his firebending. The explosion, as predicted, was loud enough to echo in the ship but not loud enough to be heard by those shopping.

Once he reached the ship, Zuko slipped inside the cargo bay, where they normally kept only cargo and didn’t set foot inside until the end of a trip. Unfortunately, he’d made a minor miscalculation. Very minor. It was just that this ship seemed to have been renovated some time within the past three years, and his initial plan of staying in the cargo bay until they reached shore and leaving the same way he’d come in wouldn’t exactly work anymore, because he was in someone’s bedroom.

He had to act fast. Zuko turned the door handle, tugged it open a crack, and pressed himself to the wall behind it. When no one came to investigate the opened door, he darted into the hallway and towards what he dearly hoped would still be the bridge. To his relief, it was. He lightly closed the door, pushed as much furniture as he could against it, and went for the steering wheel. I hope June’s aboard, because this ship is sailing. He felt bad that he might be inadvertently leaving her behind, but bounty hunters didn’t go out of their way for each other, even during an alliance. She certainly wouldn’t have even remotely inconvenienced herself for him, and she was level-headed enough that he doubted she’d hold it against him if he treated her the same way.

Still, he was relieved when he heard someone push against the door, followed by her shouting irritably, “Hey, Blue, it’s me!” Zuko let go of the steering wheel to let her in. She whistled as she entered, striding leisurely enough that he assumed she’d already checked the ship for stray soldiers, which was another relief. “I gotta say, I’ve never hijacked a Fire Nation war ship before. Working with you is always a unique, if stressful and aggravating, experience.” Zuko didn’t know whether to interpret that as a compliment or an insult, so he ignored the comment completely. “You know the way to Crescent Island?”

“Yes,” Blue bit out.

“Okay, okay! Sheesh, no need to bite my head off. I’ve never even heard of Crescent Island, so I wasn’t sure if you’d – “

“Stop. Talking.” Zuko hesitated, then ground out, “Please,” through gritted teeth.

June huffed and threw herself into a chair so violently it skidded across the floor and slammed into the wall. “Well, since you asked nicely.”

They spent the rest of the trip in blissful if mildly uncomfortable silence. Soon enough, they were nearing Crescent Island. “I’m positive he’s going to Avatar Roku’s temple,” Blue announced. “He’s probably going to try and get in touch with his past life. To what end, I can’t say, but it’s the most logical conclusion.”

June rolled her eyes. “You actually believe all that spiritual mumbo-jumbo?”

Zuko sighed heavily. “I’m not interested in arguing with you over this. Agree to disagree. The point is, I’m sure he does, whether you do or not. He’s the Avatar, and more importantly, he’s an Air Nomad. Before the genocide, Air Nomads were well-known for their faith in the spiritual aspects of life.”

“Why do you know all this?” June demanded.

My honor hinges on me knowing all this. “It doesn’t matter. What, do you think I’m lying to you?”

June slammed her fist down on a nearby surface. “Why are you so damn defensive? I was just making conversation! God, I hate working with you.”

“The feeling is mutual, I assure you.” Not a moment too soon, they reached the island. “This way.” Zuko headed for the door and gestured for her to follow him with a jerk of his head. “There’s a hole in one of the bedrooms. That’s how I got on board, and that’s how we’ll get off-board.” They made their way to the bedroom and slid through the hole into the water, which was just below them. Then they swam to shore.

“Since you know so much about this place, I assume you know where this temple is?”

“Yes.”

“Great. Let’s go.”

Zuko had settled the boat as close to the temple as he could, so they had only half an hour at the most of walking time before they reached the entrance to the temple. “Is there a more discreet way into this place?” June looked around dubiously.

“Not that I know of,” Blue revealed reluctantly. “We’ll have to enter the normal way and hope for the best.”

June’s eyes landed on something behind him and widened in alarm.

Zuko groaned. “Don’t tell me. Company.”

“Right on the money, Blue. War ship incoming, like, fast. We gotta get the Avatar and bolt.”

Zuko cursed. “Run.”

They dashed into the temple, forgetting about secrecy – if Fire Nation soldiers caught them intruding on sacred ground, the results would be none too pleasant. As they ran up staircase after staircase to reach the top, Zuko ran headfirst into a bright green someone running in the opposite direction. He caught her mouth with his upper arm, and they tumbled to the ground in a heap. When he composed himself, he realized he was looking directly at one of the people he least wanted to be within arm’s reach of – Suki, the Kyoshi Warrior. “You!” she snapped at him.

“Blue!” Aang exclaimed, and then did a double take. “Wait, you two know each other?”

“Unfortunately,” Zuko growled.

“Yeah, no kidding! You stabbed me in the foot!”

“You threw a torch at me!”

“You were intruding on sacred ground!”

“How was I supposed to know that?!”

“Well, maybe if you weren’t sneaking around in the middle of the night like some kind of Fire Nation spy – “

“Enough!” June shouted, taking Aang by the back of his shirt and lifting him to his toes. “We’re all intruders on ‘sacred ground’ now and I’m not sticking around to see what Fire Nation soldiers do to those!” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a shirshu spit dart. Before she could jab Aang with it, however, a blast of firebending knocked it out of her hand.

Suki jumped to her feet and readied herself in a warrior’s stance, as did Zuko. A Fire Sage faced them, narrowing his eyes determinedly. “You will not take the Avatar!” he declared.

“Are you helping us?” Suki asked in shock.

“Isn’t this treason or something?” June pointed out, maintaining her grip on Aang’s shirt.

“The Fire Sages are supposed to serve the Avatar, not the Fire Lord. Even if my brothers have forgotten that, I have not. My name is Shyu, and I will assist the Avatar and any ally of his in any way that I can.”

“Great!” Aang chirped. “I really need to find Avatar Roku, can you tell me where he is?”

“Enough talking.” Zuko drew his broadswords. “The Avatar is coming with us.”

Suki charged at him with her fans. Before she could reach him, however, Zuko heard a distant but hauntingly familiar call. “Search the temple! Do not let the Avatar escape again!”

“Zhao,” Zuko and Suki hissed at the same time.

“Uh, who?” June asked.

“He’s the commander who nearly burnt down my village until Aang showed up,” Suki explained. “He’s been chasing us since then.” She glared at Zuko. “How do you know him, anyway?”

“That’s none of your business,” Zuko snapped icily. “In any case, I’m getting out of here. We all need to get out of here. I don’t know why you came, but it can’t possibly be important enough for you to risk getting caught by Zhao.”

“I have to talk to Avatar Roku!” Aang protested. “Why does no one understand this? If one of my past lives is showing me a vision about a comet, I think that’s pretty important!”

“…A comet?” Zuko paled.

Aang nodded vigorously. “Yeah, a comet! Do you know what that’s about?”

Zuko shook his head. “No. The only comet I know about is Sozin’s Comet. That’s what happened the day Fire Lord Sozin – “ Zuko swallowed. The day Fire Lord Sozin killed everyone you ever knew.

“It doesn’t matter!” June snapped. “We don’t have time for a history lesson!”

“I have to hear what Avatar Roku has to say!” Aang insisted.

“Then stay here! The bounty isn’t worth this.” June threw her arms in the air and started to leave, but she stopped to stare in disbelief at Zuko, who was stationary. “Blue. Don’t you dare – “

“Do you know how to steer a boat?” he asked quietly. “Do you know the way back from here?”

“Damn it, Blue!” June snarled at him. “Fine. Fine! I guess I’m staying to help you bunch of dumbasses too.”

“I don’t understand,” Suki interjected.

“Well, no surprise there,” Zuko sneered.

“Excuse me?”

“We don’t have time for this!” Aang implored them. “If you two are helping, then help. Shyu, how do I get to Avatar Roku?”

“This way!” Shyu shifted a light on the wall and pressed his palm to where it had been. He closed in eyes, concentrating, and Zuko felt heat radiating from his hand even from a distance as a secret passage opened. “Come on!” he urged them, dashing into the passage. Suki and Aang ran after him. Zuko and June exchanged glances before following.

Naturally, Suki could not stop griping at him even long enough to run for their lives. “I can’t believe you,” she fumed.

“What did I do now?!”

“I mean, I never thought you were a good guy, but this is pretty low, even for you! Hunting down the world’s last hope just for money?”

“What do you mean, for money?” Aang asked, bewildered. Zuko glared at his back. He knew where this was going.

“He’s a bounty hunter, Aang,” Suki explained patiently. “Right now, you’re the bounty. If he brings you to the Fire Lord, he probably gets enough money to live comfortably for the rest of his godforsaken life and then some, even if he splits it with the other one.”

“My name is June,” June snapped, but she was ignored.

“Suki, that's not it at all! Blue has to capture me so he can go home to his family!”

“What are you talking about?” Suki sounded genuinely confused now.

“When Blue had me tied up on his boat, he told me that his father would only let him come home if he caught me first,” Aang elaborated cluelessly.

“That doesn’t make any sense.” Suki shook her head. “It was a trick, Aang, he just wanted you to let your guard down.”

“Why would he need your guard down, though?” June pointed out mildly. Zuko shot her a look of betrayal. He couldn’t believe all three of them were gossiping about him right in front of him. “I mean, you said he had you tied up, right? So then why would he need your guard down?”

“What difference does it make?!” Zuko demanded, stopping to face her. “No matter why I’m hunting you, Zhao is in this temple with us right now and I swear to Agni I am not getting captured by him and neither is the Avatar! So keep running, damn it!”

Suki jolted back into action, and the five of them reached a large, complicated door soon. “No!” Shyu cried in despair. “This is awful! They closed the door.”

“So? Just open it,” June hissed.

“I can’t just open it. Only a fully-realized Avatar can open it. Otherwise, all five sages have to be here to open it with five simultaneous blasts of firebending.”

“Blasts,” Zuko muttered pensively. “Blasts – blasting jelly!” He reached into his satchel and retrieved the diminutive container of small but potentially powerful clumps of jelly.

June cackled. “Blue, you’re a genius.”

Zuko spread the jelly in each of the five slots, and then he, Suki, Aang, and June backed away behind some pillars while Shyu used his firebending across the five slots. The room shook with the force of the combined explosion, and when the smoke cleared, the door was wide open.

“Yes!” Aang cheered. “Thanks, Blue! You’re the best!”

“Hurry up and talk to Roku,” Zuko grumbled.

Aang nodded and darted into the room. Shyu closed the doors behind him.

“Oh, great,” Suki groaned. “I’m stuck in a room with you until he’s done.”

“If anyone should be complaining here, it’s me,” Zuko complained. “You’re the one who nearly killed me.”

“Please,” Suki scoffed. “All it would have done was burn your face a little.”

“Yeah, I'm really sorry that I don’t want my face burned again!” Zuko exclaimed incredulously. “What a crazy thing to try and avoid! So sorry to have inconvenienced you.”

“Ooh, again?” June echoed, interest evidently piqued. Zuko cursed himself. “So that’s what you were saying earlier, about your actual face being more distracting than the mask! You’ve got some kind of nasty burn on your face, is that it?”

“Wait.” Suki scowled. “A burn on your face…? No, it can’t be.” Zuko stilled as Suki came dangerously close to a realization he would rather her not make.

“What is it?” June leaned forward curiously.

“There was a visitor on Kyoshi Island,” Suki recalled slowly. “A teenager around my age. He had a burn covering the left side of his face. He approached me in the marketplace when I was watching Aang to tell me about a crime going on nearby.” She squinted at Zuko. “That would be awfully convenient, but there’s no way you’re that young. Are you?”

“What do you want me to say?” Zuko said exasperatedly. “I could tell you I’m twenty years old and have never set foot in the Kyoshi Island marketplace, but I doubt you’d just take my word for it, so what’s the point?”

“You’re right. It doesn’t make a difference,” Suki decided venomously. “You’re reprehensible either way. It doesn’t matter how old you are or how far you went to catch Aang. The fact that you would try at all, when he’s the only person who can defeat the Fire Lord, end the war, and restore harmony, is unforgiveable.”

“Thankfully, I don’t need your forgiveness, little girl,” Zuko sneered at her.

As Suki puffed up her chest, likely about to tell him exactly what she thought of his response, Shyu hissed, “Shh! I hear footsteps!”

Suki grabbed Zuko’s arm and yanked him behind a column. His heart pounded. He could not be caught by Zhao – not now, when he was so very close to fulfilling his father’s last request. And he wasn’t letting Zhao get his slimy hands on the Avatar either, for both his sake and Aang’s. He didn’t want to imagine how Zhao would treat him.

“Can you swim?” he hissed to Suki.

She opened her mouth, then closed it and nodded wordlessly, watching him with thoughtful, calculating eyes.

He turned to the column on their right, behind which June and Shyu hid. “Can you two swim?”

They both nodded.

Zuko took a deep breath. “Okay. Okay….” He pulled the rope meant for the Avatar out of his satchel. “A fall from this height could do serious damage, even landing in water. If I tie one end of this rope around your wrist and one end around June’s wrist, if you two go on either side of a column and each go out one of those windows, the column can probably hold your combined weight…. That would cut the height down a bit…. Shyu, you and I could climb down one side each…. I don’t know if the rope is that strong, though….”

“I will stay here,” Shyu volunteered. “I will help the Avatar escape once he’s finished communicating with Avatar Roku, and then I will face the consequences for my actions.”

“Thank you, Shyu.” Suki bowed solemnly. “We will not waste this sacrifice.”

All too aware of the rapidly dwindling seconds between them and their capture at Zhao’s hands, Zuko hurriedly tied the the rope to both girls’ wrist. Suki walked around the column so that the rope was wrapped loosely around it. Then Shyu firebended at the window, and Suki and June leapt through. Zuko waited a few seconds, and then, once he saw the rope go taut as Suki and June reached the full extent of its length, he leapt through the window.

Grimacing, he used the daggers in his heels to scrape along the building and slow his descent. These are going to be blunt after this. I hope I can afford replacements. He caught Suki’s rope with his right hand, hissing as he felt the friction do serious damage to his palm. Suki reached out and grasped his left hand, steadying him. The rope started lowering them thanks to their combined weight. He got a better grip on the rope and, as June was raised almost back to the window, cut through the rope between him and Suki, sending her diving into the water below and him flying back up.

As he’d hoped, the weight change caused a see-saw effect; he was raised disproportionately high, and at his peak, was several yards higher than June despite probably weighing at least as much as her if not substantially more. Before gravity could correct the situation, he let go. June squeaked in alarm - do not forget to make fun of her for that later, Blue - and Zuko used his shoe-daggers to slow himself down, an advantage June didn’t have.

“Spread out!” June shouted. It took Zuko a second to understand what she meant; her arms and legs were spread, leaving her body horizontal.

Zuko took the instructions at face value, leaning back and stretching his limbs in opposite directions. But because he was facing the wrong way, and was falling just slightly ahead of June, he was completely unprepared for the water slamming painfully against his back as he was submerged in the ocean. He panicked immediately, instinctively drawing breath and choking on the water. Water poured into his lungs, triggering the instinct to draw breath, but more water was drawn instead. Struggling against the urge to flail, Zuko cracked his eyes open to see the surface much farther than it should have been -

The next thing he knew, he was vomiting water onto safe, steady land. “You can’t swim?!” someone shrieked at him. Wiping water from his chin, he looked up to see a blurry Kyoshi Warrior glaring at him in disbelief.

“Can,” he muttered blearily. “Jus’ bad at it.”

“Blue, I can’t decide if you’re a badass or a dumbass,” June told him gleefully. “Or should I call you…, Red?” She dangled something in front of him. Zuko blanched. It was his mask.

“You are that kid from the marketplace!” Suki accused.

“’M not a kid,” Zuko snapped, lunging for his mask and tumbling back to the ground when June stepped to the side. His reflexes must still be a little off from the near-death experience.

Suki actually outright laughed at him. “You can’t be more than a year older than me!”

“I’m twenty,” Zuko asserted.

Now June laughed at him. “Twenty? I’m twenty. You’re, like, ten.”

Zuko sighed heavily. “I’m sixteen.”

June whistled. “Damn. Where’d you learn to fight so well at sixteen? I’ve seen you wielding those swords.”

“Rich family,” Zuko muttered defeatedly. “And lots of practice.”

“What were you doing as a bounty hunter at fourteen?” Suki questioned surprisingly mildly.

Zuko resisted the urge to firebend her back into the ocean. “My mom’s dead, my dad’s an asshole, my uncle killed himself, and my sister’s a psychopath,” he snarled, counting off his fingers as he listed each relative. “What were you doing as a Kyoshi Warrior at fourteen?”

“Thirteen,” Suki corrected quietly. “My parents went to war. I wanted to carry my own weight in the village. I’m a fast learner.”

“Great. Now that the heart-to-heart is over, can I have my damn mask back please?” Suki looked genuinely hurt by his flippancy, enough so that Zuko almost felt bad about it, but then again, how was he supposed to know that the Kyoshi Warrior protecting the Avatar would be emotionally impacted by the opinions of the bounty hunter doggedly impeding her? He held his hand out to June, who reluctantly gave him back his mask. He immediately put it back into place on his face.

“So you, what, ran away from home?” June asked, because apparently she was physically incapable of restraining her incessant nosiness.

“What is this, an interrogation?!” Zuko demanded hostilely. “My personal life is not for you to know! End of story!”

“Geez!” June held up her hands innocently. “You really need to chill.” She grinned wickedly, gesturing to the left side of her face. “Get it? Chill? Because of the burn on your face?”

Zuko stared at her in disbelief.

Suki snickered.

It was very lucky for Suki and June that that was when Aang chose to drop from the sky, because he was very, very close to murdering them both on principle. “Hey guys - what’s up - sorry - don’t have time to talk because if I stop you’ll probably kidnap me - Suki hang on tight - nice seeing you!” he shouted cheerfully as he swooped by on his glider, holding out an arm which Suki grabbed onto as he passed.

June sighed. “Still got that cloth, Blue?”

Zuko scowled. “Of course.”

Chapter Text

These zombies in the park
They're looking for my heart
A dark world aches
For a splash of the sun

Cough Syrup by Young the Giant

Act 1: The Bounty Hunter

Chapter 3: Splash of the Sun

“What are they doing?” June complained as they passed through the same town for the third time in as many days.

“Trying to lose us?” Zuko shrugged. “It’s not like they know about Nyla.”

“Okay, but why are they going in circles then?” June demanded. “Shouldn’t they be trying to go faster to get rid of us? I mean, they travel by air, for spirit’s sake!”

Zuko rolled his eyes. “June, we’re hunting down a fifteen-year-old girl who’s never left her village and a twelve-year-old boy who didn’t even know there was a war a few weeks ago. They’re hardly criminal masterminds.”

“That should just be common sense,” June muttered indignantly.

“Whatever! It doesn’t really matter, does it? No matter where they went or how they tried to lose us, they couldn’t possibly. There’s no sense in debating which way they should go about it. That’s just a waste of breath.”

“Hey! Respect your elders, punk!”

Never again. He was never, ever, ever working with her again. Agni, he’d had no idea one person could be capable of being such a nuisance. Somewhere out there, his father surely laughed at his predicament. “It’s getting dark. We should start looking for a place to camp.”

“I still say we’re setting up camp too early each night,” June disagreed. “If we cut back on just a couple hours of sleep every night, we’d catch them much faster.”

“No. We need to be at our best when we face the Avatar and his friend. They may not be the most powerful, but they are clever.”

“A fifteen-year-old girl and a twelve-year-old boy might be able to outwit you, but not me, squirt.”

“Oh, really? Is that so? Which of us is the more famous bounty hunter despite only two years of experience and, that's right, no shirshu?”

“Yeah, and which of us had loaded parents who probably spent pounds and pounds of gold on the best sword-fighting lessons money could buy?”

“Being a bounty hunter isn’t just about strength and talent. It’s about persistence. Patience.”

“Ha! Are you trying to say you’re more patient than me?”

“I’m not trying to say anything. I’m saying it.”

“I swear, someone needs to teach you a bit of respect.”

Zuko’s jaw tightened. “Go right ahead and try. Smarter and stronger people than you have plenty of times before.”

“Why are you so fucking serious? Can’t you take a joke?”

“I’m not interested in jokes. We do the job, we get paid, we part ways, and we never see each other again.”

“Fine by me.”

Zuko pointed to a nearby clearing. “Look – that’s the perfect campsite. Let’s just stop for the night and start again tomorrow.”

“Whatever. Anything to make you shut up.”

Zuko bit back his next sarcastic reply in favor of sliding off of Nyla in silence and setting up his sleeping bag. Every single one of their conversations seemed to be in that vein. Interacting with June was always frustrating, and working with her moreso, but traveling with her had to be one of his most aggravating experiences in all the time since his banishment. If it went on too much longer, one of them was going to snap and kill the other.... Well. June might snap and try to kill him, anyway.

Luckily, it seemed that it wouldn't go on much longer at all. The next day, they ended up right back at the pier where they’d stolen a Fire Nation ship. Zuko suggested that they visit a contact of his to see if they had any information.

“For three silver, I might know something,” Oh purred. He leered at June. “Or a night with a pretty lady.”

Enemy or not, Zuko didn’t appreciate the way June was being sized up like a piece of meat by his longtime ally. He reached into his money pouch and placed three silver on the counter as calmly as he could manage. “What do you know?” he said through gritted teeth.

If either of them noticed his discomfort, they didn’t react to it in any way. Oh scooped up the money. “A boy with a bald head and some strange arrow tattoos did come here earlier today. I’m not fond of him myself; that’s the only reason I gave you such a cheap price. He was here with an Earth Kingdom girl and a pair of dark-skinned siblings – probably Water Tribe.”

“Water Tribe…?” Zuko echoed, mostly to himself.

”A couple of teenagers in the Southern Water Tribe found me… I put their tribe in danger, so... they... kicked me out.”

“Yeah, that’s right. I can’t imagine anyone else who would steal a Waterbending scroll.” Oh scowled. “We were selling that for 200 gold pieces. Stolen, right out from under our noses!”

“Wait. Three teenagers and a preteen stole 200 gold from you?” June summarized incredulously. “And you just let them? What kind of pirates are you?”

Now Oh eyed her much more hostilely. “Whoever those kids were, they weren’t ordinary kids. That bald kid, he did… something. I couldn’t tell you what it was, but it was powerful. Looked like some weird kind of bending.”

Uh oh. Zuko had been considering inviting the pirates to work with them to catch the Avatar and retrieve the scroll, but now he thought he and June better get out of there before the pirates realized who they’d fought earlier, or else they might go after the Avatar themselves. “Thanks for the heads-up, Oh. Nice doing business with you, as usual. I’ll see you around.”

“See you around, Blue,” Oh replied amicably.

Zuko and June left the merchants. “So they picked up two others,” June grumbled, massaging her forehead. “We’ll definitely have to use the element of surprise to get him now.”

“On the other hand, this could be good news,” Zuko pointed out. “I guarantee one of them is a waterbender, or else they wouldn’t have bothered with the scroll; I doubt the Avatar could learn waterbending from a piece of parchment. No, he would have just waited until they reached the North Pole as they’d planned. While this makes them more dangerous, it also means they’re probably going to try and find time to practice. If we’re careful and don’t let them know we’re hunting them, we’ll definitely catch up soon.”

June nodded slowly. “Okay. Let’s keep going.”

They didn’t have to go very far. It turned out the group was foolish enough to stop for practice that same day. When Zuko and June heard a distant splash a few hours later, they exchanged glances and silently slipped off of Nyla. June tied her to the nearest tree, and they traveled on foot in the direction of the splash. It wasn’t long before they reached the outskirts of an obvious campsite right next to a river, led directly there by a familiar voice and an unfamiliar voice discussing waterbending. June smirked at Zuko and the two of them retreated a short distance. “I can’t believe they’re so stupid,” she whispered triumphantly. “Now we just wait for nightfall.”

“I’ll keep an eye on them,” Blue whispered back. “Make sure they don’t go anywhere.”

“Good idea, Blue. I’ll stay with Nyla.”

June left him there, and he retreated a short distance, scaled a nearby tree, and settled in to watch over them for a few more hours.

Later on, while the Avatar and his three friends slept, June snuck back to Zuko. “Ready?” she hissed. Zuko nodded firmly. “Good. Let’s get this over with, finally.”

Zuko slipped down from his perch, and they carefully tiptoed to the clearing where their four opponents were lying in their sleeping bags. Zuko tapped her on the shoulder and mimed tying a knot, then put his wrists together, then gestured to Aang and the forest and shrugged at her. Tie him up first, or carry him away first?

June pointed at the forest. Carry him off.

Zuko nodded, crouched, and cautiously slid his arms beneath Aang’s sleeping bag, then lifted him and walked off with him.

As he tied Aang’s wrists and ankles together at the clearing with Nyla, Aang’s eyes started fluttering open. “Wh-Wha…?”

Zuko hastily removed his belt and gagged Aang with it. “Sorry,” he muttered, unable to meet Aang’s eyes.

“Stop interacting with the prisoner,” June ordered.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Zuko bit out.

“Then don’t do stupid things.”

Zuko threw his hands in the air. “I’m just apologizing for gagging him! How is that stupid?”

“Um, maybe because you shouldn’t be sorry?” June narrowed her eyes at him. “If you’re going soft – “

“I’m not going soft,” Zuko growled. “Just forget it. Let’s go.” He placed Aang on his stomach across Nyla’s back and steadied him before hopping on himself. June sat in front of Aang, sandwiching him between the two of them. However, before they could take off, a scream tore through the silence. Zuko looked at June in alarm. “They’ve realized he’s gone! We have to go, now.”

“Relax, Blue! The pirates probably had the same idea as us.”

Zuko froze. “The pirates?”

“Yeah, they’re probably just taking back the scroll and teaching those brats a lesson while they’re at it.” June sighed. “Shame. I kinda liked that warrior girl.”

“They’ll kill them,” Zuko realized.

“That doesn’t concern us,” June retorted. “Listen, if you want to go back for them, be my guest. I’m not losing the Avatar. Not again, not for a bunch of idiot kids with sticky fingers.”

Zuko finally looked at Aang. His gaze was pleading, shining with unshed tears. Zuko looked up at the back of June’s head. He looked down again, then anywhere but at Aang. Damn it. Damn it, damn it, damn it! “Fine. Let’s just go.”

“Great. Let’s.” Nyla took off.

Zuko took a deep breath, and then he took Aang’s shirt and threw them off of the shirshu, instinctively pulling Aang to his chest and taking the blow as they hit the ground.

“Blue, you bastard!” June shouted. She dug her heels in, hard, and Nyla skidded to a stop.

Zuko quickly drew his swords and sliced open Aang’s bonds. Aang yanked the gag down around his neck. “Thank you,” he gasped in relief. He airbended himself to his feet and pulled Zuko to his feet. “Thank you so much, I can’t lose them, Blue – look out!” He pushed his hands out, blasting Zuko into a tree. Caught off-guard, he fell to his knees, coughing. He lifted his head to glare at Aang, but then he caught sight of a dart that had wedged itself into the tree that had been right behind him seconds ago.

“Nice moves, Avatar,” June sneered. “But it won’t be enough to save you. Nyla, sic ‘em!” She whipped Nyla, who howled and lashed her tongue out at Aang. Aang just barely evaded the attack, leaping into the air. He lost no time at all, pushing off of a tree with his feet and launching himself directly at June. She ducked, but as he passed over her head, he swiveled midair and landed on his feet behind her before slamming his open palm into her back. She fell forward, but only to her knees; evidently Aang was trying not to seriously injure her, much to Zuko’s chagrin. Zuko quickly unsheathed his swords and lunged for June. She cursed violently and ran for Nyla; obviously she wasn’t interested in taking him on in a fair fight, which, Zuko thought smugly, was pretty smart on her part. “This ain’t over, Blue!” she shouted over her shoulder as she hopped onto her pet and took off.

“I’m sure it’s not,” Zuko muttered.

He and Aang ran to the campsite. “What’s going on?” Aang wondered. The campsite was empty, save for the flying bison and some supplies on the ground. “Appa, what happened?” Aang asked of his pet, sounding like he actually expected an answer. Appa roared in response; Zuko was taken aback by the genuine anxiety he could detect in the creature’s tone. Aang turned to Zuko, brow furrowed. “This isn’t good.”

“You think?” Zuko retorted. “Where the hell are your friends?”

“Right here.”

Horror draining the blood from his face, Zuko pivoted. Oh and at least half a dozen other pirates stood behind them, with Suki and two Water Tribe teens tied up. “Hello,” he greeted Oh, forcing his voice into something like politeness. “Did you find the scroll?”

“Even better,” Oh answered, baring his teeth in a mockery of a smile. “We found the Avatar.” He gestured to Aang.

“That, you did,” Zuko agreed. “What now?”

“Now, you’re going to hand him over, and we’re going to deliver him to the Fire Nation,” another pirate revealed.

“Hmm. Is that so?” Zuko tilted his head to the side. “Why would I do that?”

“Because you’re outnumbered? Or have you forgotten how to count?” a third pirate chortled.

“Am I, though? I count six of you versus me, and, you know, the Avatar, master of all four elements.” Zuko had no idea what he was doing. They would see right through his bluff immediately, but he had to say something. There was a way out of this. There was. There had to be. He just had to stall until he figured it out.

A couple pirates shifted uncomfortably, glancing at Aang with newfound alarm, but the second pirate laughed. “He’s just a boy! He has no idea how to do anything other than run. And with his friends in danger, he’s not going to do a damn thing other than turn himself in.”

“Turn himself in, so that you can kill the leverage? How does that make sense?” Zuko narrowed his eyes. “The way I see it, the longer Aang and I resist, the longer those three stay alive.”

“Good point.” The second pirate smirked nastily. “Of course, alive is pretty vague.” Zuko’s blood ran cold. “I can think of a million things to do to this one without even hurting her.” He patted Suki’s head. Suki squeezed her eyes shut, silent tears running down her cheeks, but then she opened her eyes and lifted her chin.

“You act like I care what happens to them, anyway,” Zuko retorted. “I’m just here for the Avatar.”

“Yeah, right. Admit it, Blue, you’re a bleeding heart,” Oh interjected.

“So what?” Zuko burst out. “Either I hand Aang over and all three of them die, or I don’t and you torture them. At the end of the day, at least maybe they’ll be alive that way. And at some point, you’ll have to stop.”

“Do we, though?” the second pirate countered. “There’s six of us. In fact, at some point, you’ll have to stop protecting him, and then he’s ours for the taking, because you’re one person and you can’t stay awake forever.”

“Watch me,” Zuko snarled, despite the inanity of the comeback; they were right, of course. Obviously he had to sleep at some point. But he was damned if he was going to give up that easily. There was something. There had to be something -

As though it had a mind of its own, the nearby river lashed out in the form of an airborne stream of water, wrapped itself around the second pirate's ankle, jerked him sharply in its direction, and plunged him briefly into its depths.

Zuko didn’t waste a second; taking advantage of the pirates’ confoundment, he dove forward, unsheathed his swords, and slashed blindly above the other teens’ heads; he felt vicious satisfaction as his blades met resistance, and yanked them back to reveal one pirate’s wrist bleeding profusely from having instinctively blocked the blow and another pirate’s forehead leaking blood into his right eye. Part of him recoiled at how close he might have come to killing that one, but he didn’t have time to worry about the pirates; he had to worry about the three kids whose lives were at stake and the fourth whom he needed in order to go home. As he pulled back, he hooked each sword in the two teens’ ropes and pulled them back with him. “Aang, cover me!” he shouted. Not waiting to see if his temporary ally would do so, he swiftly sawed through the ropes tying them up.

“Sokka, did you see that?” the girl shouted excitedly. “I did that with my foot!” Zuko blinked at her seeming lack of awareness of the situation she’d just been in. Then again, after taking a closer look at her, she couldn’t be much older than Aang; perhaps she truly hadn’t understood, at least not on an emotional level.

“Great, can we talk about that later?” the guy, Sokka, shouted back sarcastically. Without so much as a thank you, Sokka dove for the supplies, pulled out a machete of all things, and dove into battle.

“Are you actually, legitimately insane?” Zuko demanded in disbelief as he ran after him. “A machete? A machete? You can’t fight pirates with a machete!” He blocked Sokka from one pirate’s attack and immediately counterattacked, jabbing the pirate in the shoulder. The pirate yelped and retreated, dropping his sword and clutching his shoulder. Zuko hoped he’d done serious damage.

Sokka turned to him to reply, but then he cried, “Look out!” Zuko dropped into a crouch. Sokka swung his machete over Zuko’s head. Zuko glanced behind him to see a pirate covering his eyes and stumbling backwards blindly. Sokka smirked. “What was that about machetes?” Both pirates started running away. “That’s right, you better run!” Sokka called after them obliviously.

“You idiot,” Zuko barked at him. He dashed after them.

“What?”

“They’ve got Aang!”

“…What?! Are you sure?”

Zuko didn’t dignify that with a response. Why would he joke about something like that? He sliced through branches and dodged trees as he chased the two pirates through the forest, and he could hear footsteps pounding the forest floor behind him, confirming at least one of Aang’s friends joining the chase. They followed them all the way back to the river, where a boat awaited them. Cursing, Zuko put as much energy as he could into the chase, but with their headstart and, little though Zuko wanted to admit it, longer legs, the pirates were able to board the ship before Zuko reached them, and the boat started sailing just as Zuko reached the riverbank.

“They’re getting away!” Sokka announced.

“Thank you, Captain Obvious!” Zuko snarled, rounding on him and feeling entirely justified in taking his anger out on the other boy. “I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t said that just now! Really! Probably would have accidentally jumped into the river without realizing the boat was gone!”

“Fighting isn’t going to help anyone,” the girl cut in sharply. She bit her lip. “I… If I were better at waterbending, maybe I could get to them, but – “

“Hang on,” Sokka interrupted, looking around. “Where’s Suki?”

Zuko’s heart skipped a beat. “Suki?” He looked around too. “No….”

“Do they have her?” Sokka growled. From the murderous look in his eyes, Zuko could tell that he, at least, had understood the thinly-veiled threat the second pirate had made earlier.

“Sokka – “

Sokka cut the girl off. “If they took her I swear to Tui and La - !”

“Sokka!”

“What, Katara?!”

Katara wordlessly pointed upwards. Bemused, Zuko and Sokka followed her finger to the sky, where Appa was quickly gaining speed on the boat. As Appa grew closer to the boat, Suki’s head popped up out of the saddle, succeeded by the rest of her body, and then she backflipped off of Appa and onto the boat, disarmed both pirates atop the boat easily, and darted inside, beyond their line of sight. “What is she doing?” Sokka exclaimed, aghast.

“Well, I’m not just standing around,” Zuko decided. If there was something he could do, then by Agni, he was going to do it. He dove into the river and started swimming towards the boat.

“Hang on!” Katara called to him. “Yip yip!”

“Yip yip?” Zuko echoed, flipping in the water to give her a funny look. “What the hell does that even – “ Before he could properly express his confusion, a huge splash sent a wave over his head that left him spluttering. Distracted, his feet stopped for a second, and he started sinking. All the air in his lungs pushed itself out through his nose, and despite his best efforts to prevent it, his lips parted as his lungs demanded oxygen and received water instead. Luckily, before he could black out, a pair of arms lifted him up out of the water and onto a semi-steady surface. As he spat out water, he snarled fiercely at whoever was listening, “I’m so – sick - of drow- drowning!”

“Can’t you swim?” Sokka demanded.

“Yes, I’m just not good at it,” Zuko growled. “If this – this thing hadn’t tried to drown me, I would have been fine!”

“Sorry!” Katara squeaked. “I didn’t realize that was going to happen.”

“You didn’t realize that a giant monster landing in the water would cause a bit of a splash?” Zuko snapped.

“Appa’s not a monster!” Sokka defended the beast, patting it affectionately.

“I didn’t realize he’d land in the water,” Katara corrected.

Zuko sighed, reaching under his mask to rub water out of his eyes. “…Fine. I guess that’s valid. Apology accepted.”

Appa landed on the boat, and the three of them leapt off, ready to fight. However, Aang shot out from inside the boat on his glider with Suki clinging to its back. The two of them flew right over Appa before Suki exclaimed, “Aang, they’re on the boat!” Aang glanced back at them and flew back to them. The two of them landed surprisingly gracefully. Aang twirled his glider, and it snapped to a staff.

“Oh, so that’s what that thing’s for,” Zuko muttered. He'd never seen Aang do that before.

Before anyone could say or do a thing, Suki dashed at Zuko, yanked him forward, maneuvered herself behind him, and pinned him to the ground. Within moments she had his wrists and ankles bound together as he’d had Aang’s maybe an hour or two ago. “Sorry,” she said, sounding genuinely regretful. “I really don’t want to do this, especially since you just saved our lives when you had absolutely no reason to, but I can’t take the chance that you won’t try to kidnap Aang again.”

Zuko sighed in a perhaps unnecessarily put-upon way. “Whatever,” he grumbled. “For the record, though, I wouldn't have taken you on in a one-on-one fight when it could be avoided."

“Thank you!” Suki exclaimed oddly indignantly as she and Aang lifted Zuko and put him back in Appa’s saddle. “You hear that, Sokka? Why can’t you just acknowledge my superiority without feeling like less of a man, like Blue can?”

"That's not..." ...what I said at all, he finished silently, but, in light of sudden realizations, opted to drop the point in favor of bringing up a new point. "Why are you two even here, anyway? Aren’t you the two jerks who kicked Aang out of your tribe?”

“I had to!” Sokka defended himself. The three of them joined him in the saddle while Aang climbed onto Appa’s head. “I was just trying to keep my village safe, okay? I apologized to Aang, Aang forgave me, and now we’re cool! So what’s the problem? We are cool, right?” Sokka added at the end, suddenly sounding nervous.

“It’s okay, Blue!” Aang chirped after a quick, “Yip yip!” got them flying, entirely too forgiving. “Sokka had to put his tribe first. I understand that! And once he and Katara found out I was the Avatar, they traveled all the way here by boat so he could apologize in person and so that they could help me get to the North Pole.”

Zuko sniffed. “I’m sure it doesn’t hurt at all that Katara probably needs a waterbending master as much as Aang does.”

“Hey!” Katara objected. “Unlike Sokka, I wanted to go with Aang from the start.”

“It’s true,” Aang confirmed. “She insisted. She didn’t want me to go off by myself. I practically had to force her to stay with her family.”

“Katara’s cool,” Suki agreed. “Sokka, though. I’m still on your side about him.”

“You? On my side? The world must be ending.”

“Ha, ha,” Suki retorted dryly.

“So what now? Am I your prisoner?”

“No!” Aang hastily denied.

“…So what are you going to do with me, then?”

“…I don’t know.”

“We can’t really let him go, either,” Sokka pointed out. “If he’s really chased you all the way from Kyoshi Island, he’ll probably just come after you again.”

“You’re not seriously suggesting we keep him as a prisoner?” Katara questioned. “After he saved our lives?”

“He saved our lives after kidnapping Aang,” Sokka countered.

“Look, you’re right that he’s probably going to try again, but Katara’s right,” Suki put in. “Aren’t we the good guys? Even if the smart thing to do is to keep him, the right thing to do is to let him go as thanks.”

“I’m on her side,” Zuko voted.

“Oh, shut up,” Sokka grumbled without heat. “Aang? Come on, buddy. You’re on my side, right?”

“Sorry, Sokka, you’re outvoted. Where would you like us to drop you off, Blue?”

“…If you could drop me off near Omashu, I’d appreciate that.”

A mostly-silent few hours later, they landed a couple miles from Omashu. “You guys stay here,” Suki said. “I’ll take him far enough away to be harmless and let him go, okay?”

“That’s not safe!” Sokka protested. “What if he attacks you?”

“I can take care of myself,” Suki replied in a tone that brokered no argument. Sokka deflated and nodded minutely. “Aang, help me get him there? And then come back before I untie him.” Suki and Aang carried Zuko several feet from Appa before Aang dashed back with unnatural speed. Suki quickly untied him and they both stood up.

“Thanks,” Zuko muttered reluctantly. “…You can go now, you know. Or do you need me to walk away first?”

Suki hesitated. “I….” She steeled herself and bowed to him, stunning him. “I’m sorry for throwing that torch at you,” she told him solemnly. “I was young and headstrong, and I panicked. Now that I know what happened to you – well, I don’t know, but I can guess, and while at the time I thought you were overreacting by stabbing my foot, I realize now that you were just as panicked as I was, maybe more so, because me throwing that torch must have reminded you of when you got that scar. I want you to know, if it means anything to you at all, that I truly am apologetic for what happened when we met.”

“…Thank you,” Zuko said. “…I… accept your apology. And I guess I’m sorry for stabbing you, too.”

Suki looked back up with a bright smile. “I accept your apology, too, although it’s unnecessary.” She straightened her back. “Well, now that that’s over, I’m going to leave now.” She started to walk away, but then she paused one last time to toss another sentence over her shoulder. “I know this is impossible, but for what it’s worth, I hope that the next time we meet, we can meet as friends…, somehow, because I’m sure there’s good in you.” She strode off.

Zuko wrestled with himself, then shouted back, “Wait! June, the other bounty hunter, she’s probably going to start chasing you now too. If she has anything of yours, her shirshu can track your scent. You should all start wearing a little perfume, if possible.”

Suki glanced over her shoulder, beaming. “Thanks! We’ll do that!” With a cheerful wave, she hopped onto Appa’s back, and they flew away.

With a heavy heart, Zuko started walking towards the stable he’d left his ostrich horse at, trying hard not to think about what she’d said.

Chapter Text

So you swallow your heart
And you swallow your pride
You gotta be tough
If you wanna survive

Unclear by Kodaline

Act 1: The Bounty Hunter

Chapter 4: Swallow Your Heart

Wearing his mask, Zuko meandered through a marketplace, eyeing the wares speculatively. After five more days’ travel in pursuit of the Avatar, with a tip here and there as he headed in the general direction of the Northern Water Tribe, his food supply was running dangerously low. Unfortunately, so was his money supply. He only had enough money to get two weeks’ worth of food for him and his ostrich horse, but there was still a good chance he would need that money for something else, too. He decided to spend only half of his money, buying just enough to keep them both going for another week so that he would still have money in case of an emergency.

He couldn’t help stopping by the old fortuneteller’s home. Makapu Village was incredibly close to the Fire Nation, and it had been one of his and his mother’s first stops after his banishment. His mother had come down with a strange illness and the fortuneteller had been kind enough to house them for a week while she recovered. During that time, she had taught Zuko, then without his mask under the pseudonym Xin, a great deal about teamaking. It was soon after their encounter that his mother died, and about half a year after that that he heard of his uncle Iroh’s suicide.

At least, that was what the Fire Nation had called it. He knew for a fact that his mother's killer had been hired by a Fire Nation soldier, and he highly suspected his father had had both his mother and Uncle Iroh assassinated, as punishment for the scandal she’d caused in the first case and to secure his claim to the throne in the second case. No matter how Uncle Iroh had died, Zuko had retroactively appreciated the teamaking lessons from Aunt Wu a great deal. He had never gained any particular liking for the taste of it, but he still found the act of making it to be strangely soothing, reminding him of both of his only true family members.

Zuko was suddenly struck by a most peculiar wonder; would she read the fortune of a dangerous bounty hunter? It would be an absolute waste of time, but he couldn’t deny that he’d enjoy seeing the place where his mother and he had stayed so long ago. Before he could make up his mind about his next step, the door opened. “You really think I’ll get better at Earthbending if I wear more gray?” a young child questioned in wonder as she stepped through the doorway.

Aunt Wu beamed. “I do.”

They two of them stopped dead as they caught sight of Zuko. The child squeaked. “OkayI’mgoinghomenowbyeAuntWu!” She ran off as fast as she could. Zuko magnanimously did not react to her obvious and incredibly amusing terror.

Aunt Wu smiled calmly. “Hello, Blue Spirit. What brings you to Makapu Village? Here to have your fortune read?”

“Why not?” Zuko replied agreeably.

Aunt Wu quirked an eyebrow at him, but otherwise gave no indication of surprise, wordlessly stepping backwards into her home and gesturing for him to follow. He did, and soon sat across from her with a cup of tea as she read cracks in a burnt animal bone. Predictably, she frowned at them. Zuko certainly hadn’t expected a telling of his fortune to provoke any other facial expression. “You are being challenged by a test of faith,” she murmured thoughtfully. “But you will soon be plagued by bad luck, and circumstances that are out of your control. Unless you learn to control your fate, you will inevitably fail in your mission.”

Zuko strongly desired a closer wall into which he could slam his face. “Wait, I don’t understand. I’m going to be plagued by circumstances out of my control, but the only way to succeed is to control them? So I’m doomed?”

“If that’s how you choose to interpret them,” Aunt Wu mused. “Personally, I would say the spirits are telling you to take these circumstances and put them under your control.”

“Spirits, huh?” Zuko stared pensively into the depths of his tea.

“Do you believe in spirits, other than yourself?” Aunt Wu inquired amusedly.

Zuko continued his very important and detailed examination of his tea leaves. “I’m not sure,” he admitted. “My uncle did, when he was alive. I think my mother did too, although she never said so. I’ve never had a reason to believe in them myself but the two of them were right about most things so I don’t see why they couldn’t be right about spirits as well.”

“Is there a reason why spirits would be telling you to take control of your fate?”

Zuko made an aggravated noise. “There are plenty of reasons, but all of them contradict each other. How am I supposed to know which reason is the right one?”

He realized absently that what he’d said really didn’t make any sense out of context, to someone who didn’t realize he was the descendant of both Avatar Roku and Fire Lord Sozin, but Aunt Wu took it in stride. “Well, what is your mission?”

“My mission…?” Zuko massaged his temples. “Let’s just say that I somehow doubt the spirits would want me to succeed in my mission.”

“So perhaps they are telling you the opposite then,” Aunt Wu reasoned. “If taking control of your fate means you will succeed, and you truly believe they don’t want that, perhaps the spirits are advising you to let things be. This bad luck, these circumstances, don’t try to control them. Let them happen.”

“I don’t….” Zuko sighed frustratedly. “I don’t know what that means. I don’t even know where to begin to… How do I… How could I…?”

“I don’t have the answers you seek,” Aunt Wu confessed regretfully. “I can only tell you what the spirits have shown me. I cannot tell you what they mean.”

“Well, thanks, I guess.” Zuko rose to his feet and lifted his cup towards her. “If nothing else, thanks for the tea. It was refreshing.”

“Sometimes a refreshing cup of tea is just as good as a told fortune.” Aunt Wu rose as well and saw him to the exit. Before he stepped through the doorway to leave her home, she gently placed a hand on his shoulder. “One last thing. A word of advice, from the spirits. If you wish to grow as a person, you must embrace your recklessness.”

“Recklessness? I’m not reckless. I have no recklessness,” Zuko objected.

Aunt Wu shrugged. “I’m merely a messenger, dear. Now, take care, Blue Spirit.”

“Take care,” Zuko muttered back as he left, feeling a bit disappointed. It was truly the height of foolishness, but some part of him had been hoping she might somehow recognize him, maybe by his voice, or his body language, or his brief description of his mother and uncle. He knew logically that she had no reason to recognize him by any of these things, or even by his face if she’d seen it; apart from his scar, he was completely indistinguishable from the dozens of others who passed through her home daily. And apart from teaching him to make tea, she held no real significance to him either. She was just another person in a long list of those Zuko had half-heartedly, debatably befriended in his three years traveling the Earth Kingdom. But she reminded him so much of Uncle Iroh.

Little though he wanted to, Zuko stopped by the guard station before he left the marketplace to check out the wanted posters. Whether he liked it or not, he would have to take on a case pretty soon unless he wanted to starve to death before he could catch the Avatar, so he may as well check for anything easy and minimally out-of-the-way. However, when he entered the station, he wished at once that he hadn’t.

Zhao and a guard were discussing something quietly. Zuko found himself rooted to his spot in the doorway, unable to either move forward and act natural or retreat. Zhao looked up and smiled his polite but somehow threatening smile. “The Blue Spirit,” he remarked. “The infamous bounty hunter. It’s a pleasure.” Zhao held his hand out.

Zuko took it gingerly. He had no choice but to speak to Zhao now. Hoping against hope that after three years, his voice wouldn’t be recognizable, he replied a bit more gruffly than usual, “The pleasure is mine, Mr...?”

“Admiral Zhao,” Zhao introduced himself. Zuko could hardly find it in himself to be surprised by the new title. It only made sense that someone as cruel and heartless as Zhao would rise through Fire Nation ranks so efficiently. “Funnily enough, I was actually in the area looking for you.”

Zuko’s heart was doing an erratic drum solo in his throat. He could hardly believe that everyone around him couldn’t hear it. “Really? Whatever for?”

“I heard you were searching for the Avatar, and it just so happens that I am, too. Or, at least, I was.”

“Was? So you found him?” Zuko tilted his head to the side in a show of innocent curiosity.

“Yes, with the help of the Yuyan Archers. One of my peers lent them quite graciously to aid my search, and their time has been greatly rewarded. I had been planning to suggest an alliance between my party and yours, but I suppose that is no longer necessary in light of today’s events.”

“I suppose not.” Zuko lightened his tone, which felt oddly appropriate as his head was much lighter now as well, the room beginning its cycle around him in earnest. “Well, even I can’t catch everyone I put my mind to, in the end. Congratulations on your success, Admiral Zhao.” Zuko bowed low to the ground.

“Much appreciated, Blue Spirit.” Zhao nodded to him and exited the station.

Zuko nearly turned on heel and walked right back out of the station to do..., well, something. Of course, that would have been incredibly suspicious. Instead, he forced himself to turn away from the exit and examined the posters with feigned interest while his stomach somersaulted. His afternoon had just gotten a lot more complicated.

In surprising contrast to Aunt Wu’s prediction, it was pure good luck that led Zuko to pass right by an unusually occupied cave as his ostrich horse carried him faster than ever towards the Pohuai Stronghold, where he prayed he would find Aang. He did a double-take as he heard familiar voices and swerved around a rock to head right back to the cave. His ostrich horse skidded to a stop in the pouring rain outside the cave, and he dashed into the cave, never more relieved to see Suki than he was in that moment. “Oh, hey, Blue,” she greeted him, startled but not unfriendly. “If you’re here to kidnap Aang again, he’s not here. He’s been out for a few hours now. While you’re here, please tell Sokka you’re not responsible for his boomerang going missing. He’s convinced you stole it for some nefarious purpose.”

“Zhao has him,” Zuko snapped. “Zhao has Aang!”

Suki shot to her feet, followed by Katara, who was immediately attacked by a ferocious coughing fit that dragged her back down to join her brother on the ground. “What? Where?” Suki demanded, and then she added, “How do you even know that?”

“I ran into him in a nearby town,” Zuko explained. “He said he was looking for me to work with me in catching the Avatar but then he said the Yuyan Archers helped him capture the Avatar instead. I’m sure they’re going to leave with him tomorrow if they aren’t already gone.”

“And that didn’t seem at all, I don’t know, suspicious to you?” Suki asked doubtfully.

“What do you mean?” Zuko furrowed his brow. “You think he’s trying to…” He shook his head. “What exactly do you think he’s trying to do?”

“I don’t know!” Suki exclaimed. “I’m just saying, it’s something to think about.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t think we have that kind of time,” Zuko retorted. “If Zhao really does have the Avatar, he’s not sticking around. I can only hope they’re still there.”

“Where?” Katara wheezed, pushing herself back up.

Zuko stared at her for a few seconds, then at the obviously delusional Sokka who was attempting to interact with a strange, large-eared rabbit monkey, then at Suki. “What happened to them?”

Suki shrugged helplessly. “I have no idea. They’ve been coughing like crazy, and Sokka started hallucinating a few hours ago - now he's talking to Momo.”

“Fever?” Zuko demanded. “Rapid dehydration?”

“I – Yes,” Suki replied, astonished.

“I know this sounds weird, but have them suck on frozen frogs. My mother was sick like that three years ago. That’s how she got better.”

“That is weird, but I’ll do that. Thanks, Blue. Now let’s go get Aang back!”

Zuko and Suki made their way out of the cave. “W-Wait for me,” Katara called after them, breaking into more coughs afterwards. Zuko slowly turned around to see the waterbender standing unsteadily and stumbling after them. “I’m coming - !” She bent forwards, body trembling with the effort of movement.

Zuko exchanged glances with Suki, who was looking at him apprehensively. “Blue…”

“You have to stay with them,” he reluctantly agreed with her unspoken plea. “It’s okay. It won’t be the first time I had to sneak into the Fire Nation. I’ll bring him back to you.”

Suki’s gaze fixed searchingly on his own. Whatever she found must have been up to scratch, because eventually she nodded. “Thank you.”

Zuko left his ostrich horse with Suki and the others and made his way to the nearest road leading to the Pohuai Stronghold. He couldn’t tell if it took seconds, minutes, or hours, but as night fell, a covered wagon rolled across the road towards the stronghold. Zuko rolled under the cart as it passed and tightly grasped its undercarriage as it continued on its path. The wagon rolled to a stop. He waited with baited breath as a soldier inspected the contents of the wagon, then slid in the opposite direction of the footsteps and climbed into the wagon as the wagon’s underside was inspected too. He peered out of the wagon and rolled out of the back around the side of the stronghold near a hidden staircase that he only knew about from his late childhood. It was meant to be used as a secret, emergency exit, but he could enter from there just as easily.

As he snuck through the fortress, he witnessed so many soldiers gathered in one place, it must have been just about every single soldier in the stronghold. Zhao stood before them giving a speech. “…This is the year Sozin’s Comet returns to grant us its power!” he proclaimed dramatically. The soldiers cheered. Zuko grimaced and kept going. Though he had been unnerved by the lack of guards at first, now it made a bit more sense. And if Aang were chained up properly, Zhao had no reason to be especially cautious; he wouldn’t be expecting anyone with Zuko’s levels of inside information to be coming for him.

Still, Zuko was surprised to make it all the way to Aang without incident. “Blue!” Aang breathed, his whole face lighting up. Zuko felt vaguely nauseous as he took in the way Aang was strung up, his limbs stationed midair in four different directions with tight chains. Agni, Zhao was such a bastard. While Zuko drew his swords, Aang said urgently, “Blue, you have to be careful, it’s not just – “

Something sharp sank into Zuko’s back before he could slice Aang’s chains open. Suddenly his muscles locked up, and he collapsed to the ground before Aang.

“It’s not just Admiral Zhao here.” June swaggered into his line of sight, smirking at him. “How do you think he found the Avatar so easily, after all this time? With my Nyla, of course, and with a little help from one of your new friends’ boomerang. I hate to say it, but the simple truth is that I can’t take on you and the Avatar at the same time. As long as you were hunting him, I didn’t stand a chance on my own. So Zhao and I struck a deal. See, he’s got plenty of money. He doesn’t care about that. He’s looking for status, glory. So he can take all the credit for the Avatar’s capture and then he can give me the reward money and we’ll both be happy.”

“You can’t trust him,” Zuko protested. “Zhao has no honor. He will go back on your deal in a heartbeat.”

“And what would you know about honor, Zuko?” Zuko’s blood ran cold. June laughed. “That’s right. I told Zhao all about the sixteen-year-old boy with a burn scar covering the left side of his face who was dead-set on capturing the Avatar. Turns out he was only too eager to include you in our deal. The Avatar isn’t just a bounty; he’s also bait, for you. Zhao’s wanted you behind bars for a long time as both yourself and the Blue Spirit. Now, I’ve caught you directly opposing the Fire Nation, trying to save the Avatar from them. He has all the reason in the world to imprison you once and for all.” She crouched and removed Zuko’s mask. “I’ll be taking this, if you don’t mind. Call it a trophy. And this, well,” she picked up the swords he’d dropped as he'd fallen and pulled his satchel off of his body, “this is just a necessary precaution.”

She walked off with Zuko’s three most prized possessions, right after his knife and his ostrich horse. The latter, thankfully, was with Suki, safe and sound. The former was still hidden in his pocket. It was quite sloppy of June not to pat him down, but then again, he was paralyzed. “Aang,” he hissed, "your airbending. I know you can push air away from you. Can you pull it towards you, too?”

“You mean, like, to pick something up? Sure, if it’s not too heavy.”

“I have a pocket on my pants, hidden behind my belt on my left hip. Inside, there’s a knife. You could use it to cut your chains.”

“I can’t see it….” Aang worried his bottom lip between his teeth. “I don’t know if I can airbend it over if I can’t see it. And I’d have to get rid of your belt somehow first anyway.”

Zuko sighed. “So we have to wait until the dart wears off a little, then.”

“You have to be careful, too,” Aang cautioned. “That dart is still sticking out of your back – oh!” He took a deep breath, then another, then another. Zuko was afraid that he’d started hyperventilating until he felt the dart suddenly yanked out of his back, tearing a low groan of pain from him. The dart landed between Aang's teeth.

“That’s gross,” Zuko told him. “That has June’s spit.” Aang made a disgusted noise, but he didn’t reply or release that dart. “Can you reach the lock on one of your chains to pick it?” At Aang’s bewildered expression, he added, “I’ll help you. Can you reach? You know, with your mouth?”

Aang nodded, so Zuko talked him through it, feeling a wave of relief wash over him as a soft click echoed in the otherwise silent room, confirming their success. “I did it!” Aang exclaimed gleefully, the dart safely relocated from his mouth to his newly unbound hand. He quickly followed the same steps on the other three chains holding him down before tumbling out. “Mind if I borrow that knife, Blue?”

Zuko hesitated, unwilling to let someone else use his most prized possession, but it wasn’t like he had a lot of options. “Go ahead.”

Aang gingerly rolled him over, shifted his belt, and pulled the knife out. He slowly removed it from its sheath, admiring it as he did so. “’Never give up without a fight,’” he read. “Where’d you get this? This is pretty neat!”

“I’ll tell you later if we get out of this alive,” Zuko replied. “Do you know how to use that thing?”

“Uh, no. But that’s not what I’m doing anyway.” Aang pulled his tunic off and cut a life-size smiley face into it as Zuko stared bemusedly. Then he put the tunic over Zuko’s face and tied the sleeves tight around the back of his head. “June said something about needing proof that you went against the Fire Nation, right? If no one sees your face, then you’ll be fine.” He frowned. “You can’t move yet, right?”

Zuko tried to wiggle around a little. “Just my fingers and toes,” he admitted.

Aang took his arms and lifted him a bit, testing out his weight. “Geez! You’re really light! Are you eating enough?”

“Enough to get by,” Zuko dismissed. “Now really isn’t the time to discuss my eating habits.”

“Fair enough.” Aang picked him up with surprising ease. Zuko supposed he had a lot of muscle from constantly fighting off and escaping enemies. The airbender blasted the door open with a burst of airbending from his foot, revealing Zhao and two soldiers in the hallway. “…Oh no.”

Zhao scowled. “Guards, get the Avatar! And the Blue Spirit, whoever he may be.”

“No thanks!” Aang shouted. “Hang on tight, Blue! Oh, wait, you can’t. Okay, I guess I’m hanging on tight!” True to his word, Aang wrapped his arms much more tightly around Zuko’s body, and then he leapt into the air, formed a large spherical air bubble beneath his body, landed on it with one foot, and used it to carry them both onto the ceiling and over the Fire Nation soldiers. On the other side, Aang released it, somehow landing on both feet like a spider cat.

“Zhao’s office is close,” Zuko grunted. “I know we’re in a rush, but – “

“Your mask. Of course. I wouldn’t dream of leaving without it,” Aang reassured him. He couldn’t see Aang’s face, but he could easily picture the bright, quirky, cocky grin that must have accompanied those words, spoken so cheerfully even under such severe duress. Not for the first time, Zuko wished someone else, anyone else, had been the Avatar. Someone just a little more deserving of the things Aang had already been put through and surely would be put through. At the very least, someone a little less likeable. “Will we pass it on the way out?”

“Very nearly. It’s at the end of a short hallway that’ll be on our left, right before the exit.”

Zuko directed Aang all the way to the office as they lost the Fire Nation soldiers with Aang’s accelerated speed. Finally, they skidded to a halt right in front of it. “Let me go, I think I can walk now.” Aang hesitantly lowered him onto his feet, and though Zuko stumbled a bit, he managed to steady himself and secure balance. He quickly pulled his satchel over his head, stuffed Aang’s tunic inside, affixed his mask to his face, and picked up his swords. “Now let’s get out of here.”

With Zuko’s arm around Aang’s neck to aid his stability two of them scampered out of the office, but their exit was impeded by one last obstacle; June, atop her shirshu Nyla. “Going somewhere? There's no perfume on you now, Blue. Nyla, sic ‘em!”

Nyla lashed her tongue at them. Aang sent at her a strong blast of airbending that nearly knocked June off of her and succeeded in knocking her tongue away, but if they didn’t figure out a more permanent solution they would be at a standoff until help arrived for June. “Aang, give me a boost!” Zuko hissed. Without hesitation, Aang pushed air at Zuko’s feet, propelling him as he leapt up and slashed at the oil reservoir above the nearest lamp. “Bend that to Nyla!”

“Nyla?”

“The shirshu!”

In a break between fending off literal tongue lashings, Aang waterbended the soybean oil out of the reservoir and splashed it onto Nyla. Waterbending? That’s new, Zuko thought in surprise. Not that I’m complaining…, yet. Nyla snuffled in alarm and began wriggling. June toppled off of her, and Zuko wasted no time in yanking her to her knees at his feet and holding a sword to her neck. “Don’t!” Aang objected.

Zuko looked up incredulously. “She would kill both of us without blinking an eye. You know that, don’t you? And she’ll never stop hunting you. And she’ll never stop hunting me. And she’s working with Zhao.”

Aang was still giving him polar bear puppy eyes.

“She’s done terrible, terrible things!” Groaning in frustration, Zuko kicked her to the ground and put the tip of the sword to the back of her head. “Where’s the damn boomerang, June?”

June barked out a disbelieving laugh. "You really have gone soft!" At a light knock on the back of her head from the hilt of his sword, she snapped, “Alright, alright! It’s in my purse, which is hanging from Nyla’s saddle. Good luck with that.”

“Give me a lift,” Zuko said to Aang. “Like you did earlier, with that… air-bubble-thing. Just get us onto the ceiling and over Nyla.”

Aang wrapped one arm around his back and hooked it under his right shoulder. “Tuck in your knees,” he warned. Then he summoned his weird air-sphere again and sped to the ceiling. As they passed Nyla on their way to the exit, Zuko hooked one of his swords through the purse strap. They landed behind Nyla and dove for the exit. Unfortunately, once they got there, they found themselves surrounded.

“Blue, what do we do?” Aang whispered nervously as soldiers approached them on either side.

“Something stupid,” Zuko decided. “Something reckless. Aang, just how high could you possibly airbend us?”

“I once sneezed and flew about ten feet into the air,” he chirped helpfully.

“Great. I need you to waterbend that soybean oil over to us.”

“What?! Won’t that make the shirshu attack us?”

“Just do it! Trust me!”

Still eyeing him skeptically, Aang obliged, waterbending the oil off of Nyla and the ground and forming a large bubble that began approaching them. “Are you sure about this?” he whispered anxiously.

“Yes…. Alright, it’s time to jump, airbending style…, now.”

Aang pushed off the ground with his feet, using one hand to pull Zuko with him again, as Nyla lashed out at the ground where they’d been just seconds ago. They landed awkwardly on top of her, but with a few seconds’ shifting, they were seated as comfortably as they could be in her saddle, with Zuko in the front. “Keep the oil in front of us,” Zuko ordered. He smirked. “We’re riding June’s livelihood to freedom.”

With Nyla’s nose focused on a target that Aang was controlling, they were able to paralyze all of the soldiers in their way and get to the staircase that would lead them to a courtyard. Unfortunately, what seemed like at least half of the soldiers in the stronghold were waiting there for them. “I don’t think the shirshu can fight off all of these,” Aang confessed worriedly. Then his eyes lit up and zeroed in on something in the sky. “Appa!”

“Appa?” Zuko repeated in astonishment. He followed Aang’s gaze to the flying bison and its passengers who were swooping towards them.

“Grab on!” Suki shouted, throwing her left arm as far over the side as she could. Katara followed suit.

“Get ready,” Aang advised him, and then, having given him no time whatsoever with which to get ready, Aang threw him into the air. Suki caught him by the front of his tunic and yanked him closer, allowing him to get a grip on her. Behind him, he heard Aang leaping into the air to join them, and saw him on his right catching Katara’s wrist with his left hand. Suki and Katara pulled them up, and they watched as the Pohuai Stronghold and its many furious men faded into the distance. Aang faced Katara. “How did you get better so fast?” he demanded.

“This is gonna sound crazy, but Sokka and I just sucked on a couple of frozen frogs!” Katara nodded to Zuko. “Blue is the one who told Suki about that. Thanks, Blue.”

“No... problem...,” Zuko responded distractedly, a bit thrown by the sudden absence of immediate life-threatening danger.

“Where’s Sokka?” Aang asked.

“He’s still a bit feverish, so we left him in the cave with Momo and Blue’s ostrich horse,” Suki answered.

“How did you guys even find us?”

“Blue told us where you were before he went to get you.”

“We would have gone with him, but I was too sick to move and Suki had to stay in case Sokka did something crazy and I wasn’t well enough to stop him, or in case I started hallucinating and I did something crazy, so he and Suki called a truce and he agreed not to kidnap you,” Katara added.

“That’s okay. I’m just glad you two are better now,” Aang declared. He turned to Zuko. "By the way, what was that thing you cut open earlier?"

"An oil reservoir. The Fire Nation uses them to maintain the soybean oil levels in the lamps to keep the wick burning for longer."

"Whoa." Aang's eyes were round and filled with wonder as Appa landed outside the cave. "Back in my day, they just used candles."

The four of them clambered out of Appa’s saddle. Zuko handed June’s purse to Suki. “Sokka’s boomerang.”

Suki peeked inside and gave him a big grin. “That’s awesome! Thanks, Blue!” She flounced into the cave. “I’ve got a special jerk delivery for Mr. Jerk of the Southern Jerk Tribe!” Zuko made a mental note to teach her some better insults someday.

As Katara joined Suki and Sokka in the cave, Aang tugged lightly on Zuko’s sleeve. “Could we talk for a second?” Zuko nodded, deflating. He should have expected Aang to want to know what June was talking about earlier, but he couldn’t have helped hoping he would just forget about it. Aang led Zuko a short ways off from the side of Appa furthest from the cave. He looked away from Zuko, kicking the dirt. “See… I… Well, I…”

“Just say it,” Zuko told him, steeling himself.

“Zhao said he’d keep me barely alive in prison for the rest of my life,” Aang blurted out, meeting his eyes. “Exactly the way you found me.”

Zuko had only a moment to enjoy the relief that came with the unexpected subject before his stomach plunged into the depths of a familiar hatred. “That bastard,” Zuko growled. He realized then that this was no different from what he’d expected Aang to bring up; in order to reassure Aang, he would have to tell him the truth. And even if he didn't, if he was going to take away Aang’s entire future in an even worse way than his father had taken his when he was disowned and banished, then Aang at least deserved the truth. “Sit down,” Zuko sighed. “It’s a bit of a long story.

“As you probably heard earlier, my real name is Zuko. My father was – well, my father is - look, before I was disowned, I was the son of Fire Lord Ozai. He banished me for speaking out of turn during a war meeting. Then he said the only way I could ever go back to the Fire Nation was if I found and captured the Avatar, which was, obviously, an impossible task until you came back." Zuko kept his head bowed, unwilling to lay eyes on whatever judgment or, even worse, sympathy might have been shown to him. "Listen, Aang, you’re incredibly talented and impressive for your age, but you’re still just thirteen years old. As much as I’d like to believe that you could evade capture until you master all four elements and take down my father once and for all, I just don’t think that’s possible. At least if I capture you and take you home, instead of someone like Zhao, I’ll have power afterwards. I’ll be the Crown Prince. I can make sure you’re treated well even if you’re a prisoner. I can give you some measure of freedom, and after a while maybe, with your help, I can change the public’s view of the war. I can change things in the war, too, and at some point, when my father eventually dies, I could even end the war forever. But I can’t do any of those things if I don’t capture you.”

He dared to look back up. Aang stared at him, wide-eyed. “…Wow. Okay, that’s a lot to take in, but… that does make sense.” He cocked his head to one side. “I won’t just go with you, though. I have to believe that I can defeat Fire Lord Ozai before Sozin’s Comet. I can’t let the world keep suffering through this war until he dies on his own. I’ve already let the world down too much.”

“I don’t expect you to go quietly,” Zuko assured him. “I just hope you understand that I don’t want to do this. I wish you were anyone other than the Avatar. Maybe we could be friends then.”

“Let’s be friends now,” Aang decided.

“What?” Zuko stared at him, aghast. Had he heard a word of what Zuko had said?

"We want the same thing. We just want to get there in different ways. We don't have to be enemies just because you're trying to catch me."

"I think we kind of do."

Aang ignored him. “Katara said you and Suki called a truce. So you're not going to capture me tonight, which means that we can definitely be friends tonight. Besides, you don’t eat enough. Come inside and have dinner with us, as thanks for saving me… again.”

Now, that - that would be stupid. That would be reckless. That would be the most reckless thing I could possibly do; befriend the person I'm supposed to be kidnapping.

“…Okay.”

Chapter Text

Going down with my wings on fire
Guess I'll seize you in another life
Stepping out of body
You can tell everybody
Mama, I'm a kamikaze

Kamikaze by Walk the Moon

Act 1: The Bounty Hunter

Chapter 5: Wings on Fire

Zuko wasn’t sure what he was expecting when he entered another guard station the next time he visited another village, but it probably should have been the Blue Spirit mask he wore printed in black and white on a wanted poster. He stared in disbelief for much, much longer than he should have. There’s one way to get money, he thought somewhat hysterically. Worst case scenario, I can always turn myself in. Shaking himself free of his sarcastic inner commentary, he realized numbly that an unnatural silence had fallen over the station since he’d entered. Oh, wait. I’m a wanted man and I just walked right into a guard station. I guess I did just turn myself in. There was only one thing for it. He pivoted and darted out of the station.

“After him!” someone shouted, and soon he heard a cacophony of footstepin pursuit. Well, it still wasn’t the worst situation he’d ever been in. He dodged countless passersby as he sprinted through the marketplace with guards hot on his tail. Then he unsheathed his swords and shifted closer to the left so that he was blocked by stalls on that side instead of people. Thinking fast, he held his left sword out, angled so that it was slicing through the posts that held up the stall overhangs, causing said overhangs to collapse forwards and become insentient obstacles. With the added distraction for the guards, he was able to outrun them all the way to where he’d left his ostrich horse tied up. There was no time to think about it; he cut right through his only rope with one swing of his sword and set the ostrich horse to motion with a light jab of his heel. It took off, leaving most of the rope tied to the post. Zuko took hold of the reins and swung himself onto it, easily escaping the soldiers.

They stopped at the shore where Zuko had left his boat. Zuko practically fell off of his pet, exhausted, and patted it amicably. “Thanks, buddy,” he wheezed. He really wasn’t eating enough if that was enough to wear him down, and soon he would have to start rationing even more. Normally he didn’t have to worry about food too much because there were always new criminals to catch and easy money to make, but it had been nearly a season of chasing the same bounty for him and now he had to replace that rope. After all, it would be hard to catch the Avatar (or any bender, for that matter) if he couldn’t even tie him up.

Once he had time to catch his breath and feed his ostrich horse, his blood began to boil. Zhao. What the admiral had already done to him wasn’t bad enough, apparently. Now Zhao had taken away his livelihood and made him a wanted criminal. Though the chase earlier wasn’t a brand new experience for him, he certainly wasn’t prepared for it to become the rule instead of the exception. If I have to steal from someone, I swear to Agni, it’s going to be him, he seethed silently. The thought gave him pause. ...Hey, that's not such a bad idea. A vicious grin spread across his face as a plan formed in his head. If Zhao was so determined to pick a fight with him, then he’d just have to give him one. Besides which, Zhao was chasing the Avatar, and he had many more resources at his disposal than Zuko did. Why not take advantage of that? He would follow Zhao to the Avatar, dispose of Zhao once and for all, and catch the Avatar in doing so, killing two sparrowkeets with one stone.

It occurred to him that his plans were getting stranger and riskier every day. It seemed the Avatar and his friends were rubbing off on him. He wondered whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. If this new, crazy plan worked, he supposed it would be a good thing.

As he moved towards his goal, Zuko reluctantly removed the Blue Spirit mask indefinitely and packed it away. It would do him no good to wear it and hide his identity for the time being; the Blue Spirit was in a lot more danger than the banished Prince Zuko was. He and his ostrich horse traveled down the shore by boat for another day. Then Zuko rode his ostrich horse into town, a different town, and picked up another bag of feed to leave with his ostrich horse and whoever he paid to take care of his ostrich horse for a couple weeks. He settled down just beyond the marketplace to feed the ostrich horse and for the first time in a long time actually looked at his pet. Not just his pet, but his companion – his only companion for two and a half years. His friend, maybe. His friend who he had taken care of for all of that time, of course, had done his best to provide for even when he couldn’t provide for himself, but who he had never really treated like a true friend. Who didn’t even have a name.

“Do you want a name?” he asked thoughtlessly, and then squinted at it in confusion. This is a new low. I’m trying to have a conversation with an animal. Still, it didn’t seem right to leave it without a name. He tilted his head, looking around for inspiration hopefully. “…Salmon…? Trout? Boat? Ocean? Dao?” He grinned triumphantly as he turned from his dual broadswords in their sheath back to his friend. “Dao. That’s…, well, better than nothing, I hope.”

Dao lifted his head and looked at him curiously, or at least as curiously as any animal could, before returning to his meal.

Zuko knew that he was embarking on the most dangerous mission he’d ever undertaken. He knew that following Zhao and challenging Zhao came with the highest possibility of death that he’d encountered probably in his entire life. He had to do it, of course. He could obviously never work as a bounty hunter again, at least not as the Blue Spirit. The Avatar would have to be the last bounty he ever hunted. Besides which, now that Zhao knew he was the Blue Spirit, he would never stop hunting him so he could prove it. Even if he did stop, Zuko wasn’t sure he could ever forget how Zhao had stolen his whole life, had threatened Aang so cruelly, had –

It didn’t matter. Zhao would never stop hunting him, so it didn’t matter. The point was, it only just occurred to Zuko that he wasn’t the only one in danger when he endangered himself. This poor ostrich horse had followed him into so much danger whether he’d wanted to or not, and now, if something did happen to Zuko and he couldn’t return for whatever reason, he realized that he owed it to Dao to ensure that he, at least, had a future. Ideally, a much safer future than past.

Zuko rode Dao back into town and spent the entire rest of the day finding the absolute nicest, safest stable in town. It cost him an extra couple of silver pieces, but Dao deserved a treat. Besides, Zuko knew exactly how he was paying for his next few meals, even before he captured the Avatar. They got there just before nightfall. Zuko left Dao at the stable while he went to deal with the woman running the stable. “Sovon?”

A tired-looking middle-aged woman stepped towards him. “That’s me.”

“Do you have room to keep my ostrich horse for a couple weeks?”

“Sure. That’s four silver pieces and a bag and a half of feed.”

Zuko pulled the money from his pouch and handed it over. “The feed is in his saddle. His name is Dao,” he added before he’d even thought about it.

Sovon smiled at him, looking a bit less tired. “That’s a nice name. You’d be surprised at how many don’t have any name at all.”

Feeling ashamed, Zuko couldn’t bring himself to tell her he’d only named Dao a few hours ago. Instead, he said, “That’s just awful,” because it was. “…If I… Out of curiosity, if I don’t come back, what happens to him?”

Sovon frowned at him, eyes round with concern. “You do mean to come back, don’t you?”

“Of course. It’s just, well, with my line of work, I can never be sure, you know?”

I don’t have any family or friends to leave him with, went unsaid. Sovon nodded slowly, her concern fading to pity. He detested it, but for Dao, he could stand a few minutes of it. “I’ll take good care of Dao for you, no matter what,” she vowed. “I don’t let any animal get treated like they’re worth less than any human if I can help it.”

Zuko released a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. He’d asked thoroughly around town first, of course, but it was still good to hear the confirmation fall from her own lips. “Thank you,” he responded sincerely. “I hope to come back, but it’s good to know that Dao won’t suffer if I don’t.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that,” Sovon corrected. “I’m sure he’ll miss you.”

Zuko highly doubted that, but he didn’t say as much to her. He merely nodded and left.

More alone than he’d been in years, Zuko returned to town, purchased a hooded cloak and some rope, returned to his boat and went out to sea about an hour away before settling down for the night. When he woke, he paddled for about a day and returned to the town where he’d been caught. Then he put his cloak on over his sheathed blades and hid his boat and all his things as well as he could, and then went back to the marketplace where he’d very nearly been caught. As expected, the atmosphere was very tense. Zuko made small talk with a few of the shoppers about the weather, the war, and local gossip. From those conversations, he was able to glean that no one Fire Nation had been through any time recently.

He waited in the marketplace all day, keeping his eyes on the guard station. When night fell, he returned to his boat to sleep. The next day, he returned to his place in town. His patience had been thoroughly rejuvenated by the anticipation of his plans, and it was proven well-spent; as predicted, Zhao and a few of his men came marching through that day in response to the Blue Spirit's recent visit, probably to take testimonies from the witnesses and to inspect the town for him.

Zuko bided his time until an opportunity presented itself. Then he pulled a Fire Nation soldier with a similar build and facial structure into a secluded corner, gagged him, stole his uniform, and left him tied up in a place where someone was sure to find him within a day or two. He emptied the soldier’s money pouch into his own without guilt; he knew exactly how any man working for Zhao earned his pay. He put his sheath on around his waist between his pants and his armor where no one could see it, and he put his mask in his otherwise-empty satchel between his shirt and his armor. That was all he could afford to take with him.

This plan was utterly ridiculous and banked on more assumptions than he was comfortable with; that Zhao’s fleet was large enough for no one to notice a missing soldier, that Zhao wouldn’t recognize his voice should they interact despite having interacted with him as the Blue Spirit within the month, that Zuko could hold his tongue and his temper long enough to elude capture. He was an idiot, but Agni, he felt so alive, and he was surer than ever that Aang and his friends were rubbing off on him. True, he couldn’t conclusively say that they were adrenaline junkies, but considering they’d already stolen from pirates and invaded the Fire Nation in the short time he’d known them, he felt like it was a pretty good guess.

He headed back to the marketplace and met up with the other Fire Nation soldiers. “You’re the last to report back, Terong,” Zhao sneered at him.

…Uh-oh. Zuko hadn’t expected him to know that particular soldier by name. What were the odds of that? Zhao never knew anyone by name. Naturally, he’d know the one soldier Zuko decided to impersonate. “Sorry, sir.”

Zhao rolled his eyes. “A little less ‘sorry’ and a little more improvement would be appreciated, soldier. I’m getting sick of your tardiness.” Well, while it was unfortunate that Terong had singled himself and consequently Zuko out like that, at least Zhao wouldn’t suspect anything if he messed up, depending on the severity. “Your report.”

His report? Here goes nothing…. “All clear, sir.”

“Hmm.” Zhao looked away, narrowing his eyes pensively. “The Blue Spirit must have already moved on from this town.” He strode away from the marketplace. “Back to the ship, everyone.”

Zuko fell into step with the other soldiers as they followed him, dreading the implications of Zhao referencing ‘the ship.’ Sure enough, there was no fleet waiting for them, just a single ship; Zhao must have split from his fleet to check out the town, which meant that Zuko was currently impersonating a member of the crew aboard Zhao’s very own ship. Once they set sail, Zuko took yet another risk. He pulled one of the soldiers aside, a man with long, thin legs and even thinner arms, and whispered, “I’ve been feeling sick and having an upset stomach all day. I think I ate some rotten food. Could you cover for me for the rest of the day, please? I should probably go lie down for a bit.”

The soldier looked at him incredulously. “What could you possibly have eaten? We all had dinner together.”

“I picked up some egg custard tarts at the last port.”

“You dumbass,” the soldier sighed, sounding entirely unsurprised. “Of course they were bad, that was two weeks ago. You owe me one, Terong. Go take a nap.”

“Thanks…. One last thing. Could you help me there? I’m a little light-headed. I don’t want to fall down and have Zhao throw me overboard for clumsiness or something.”

“Yeah, that’s valid,” the soldier agreed. He looked around for bystanders, and when there were none, put Zuko’s arm around his neck and wrapped his own arm around Zuko’s waist before guiding him to his room, quite helpfully showing him exactly which room was his. He even opened the door for him and helped him get into bed. “Feel better soon, buddy.” He walked back out of the room, closing the door behind him.

Zuko sighed in relief. So far, so good.

He was able to glean more information about Terong and his post by leaving his room to use the bathroom in the middle of the night, waiting until he heard footsteps in the hallway outside, leaving the bathroom and asking casually if he’d been missed at his post today. The soldier he’d asked had laughed so hard he’d had to muffle the sound with his fist for a good few seconds. Then he’d answered, “Terong, you cocky son of a bitch. You better be careful once you’re done with this internship, because the governors you’re going to be working with aren’t going to appreciate your attitude like we do.”

Zuko tried as hard as he could to react appropriately to this new information. “Thanks for the tip,” he said nonchalantly enough that the soldier could choose to interpret his tone as either appreciative or sassy. Hopefully he would simply interpret it in a way that fit with his understanding of and experience with Terong.

The soldier didn’t seem to notice anything out of the ordinary. He merely chuckled and clapped Zuko’s shoulder, shaking his head fondly as he walked into the bathroom and shut the door behind him. Zuko walked back to Terong’s room and collapsed on the bed, thanking the spirits that his request to the thin soldier early had been vague. ‘Cover for me’ could have meant either to take over his job for the day, which was how he’d meant it, or to make up an excuse for his absence, which was probably how that soldier had actually taken it.

It was a good thing Zuko had so much background information on the inner workings of the Fire Nation, because someone else in his position might have been completely lost. The offspring of nobility who were to inherit their parents’ prosperity and power were expected to spend at least four years in some form of military so that they knew what they were talking about. The idea was nice, but it usually failed because the offspring ended up getting coddled throughout their service and came out of the experience with no idea what war was really like. On a rare occasion, a noble heir who was either prodigious in some field or the offspring of someone really important would be allowed to intern with some form of military leadership before they reached the age of majority so that they wouldn’t have to waste time on the frontlines like some common peasant. Terong must have been both to be interning with someone as high-up as Zhao.

He had a new problem now. If Terong had been interning with Zhao, then Zuko could not possibly continue to stake his life and mission on Zhao not noticing that Terong wasn’t aboard the ship. He’d have to leave the ship at the earliest opportunity and find another way to get rid of Zhao and capture the Avatar.

Zuko waited until morning to begin investigating a way off of the ship.

He was very, very, very glad he did.

“The North Pole?” Zuko repeated Zhao’s words, hoping his interest sounded more curiosity-based than personal. “You’re referring to the Water Tribe?”

Zhao clasped his hands together and rested them on the table in front of him. “Yes. It’s about time we took over that territory anyway. Since I’m sure the Avatar is going there, now is the perfect time.”

“You’re right. I mean, of course you are, sir. Why has it taken us so long to take over, if you don’t mind my asking?” There. That seemed like a pretty diplomatic way of asking what had changed; the Northern Water Tribe was one of the few places in the world that the Fire Nation had yet to touch, along with places like Omashu and Ba Sing Se, so Zuko personally would have considered the Avatar's presence a reason not to invade.

“The Northern Water Tribe is still full of waterbenders and warriors,” Zhao cautioned. “They are not to be underestimated. However….” He smirked. “I know exactly how to disable half of their fighting force.”

“Disable?”

“Where do firebenders draw their power from, Terong?”

“The sun.”

“So where do waterbenders draw their power from?”

“The moon?”

“Precisely.”

“…I… still don’t understand.”

“It’s simple, Terong. I’m going to kill the Moon Spirit.”

Zuko’s jaw dropped, and he felt quite justified in allowing it to do so. “But… how?”

“In a library long ago in the middle of the Si Wong Desert, I learned of a spirit oasis in the middle of the North Pole, within which the Ocean and Moon Spirits reside. During our invasion, I’m going to make my way to this spirit oasis and kill the Moon Spirit. No waterbender will ever be able to use their power again.”

“Admiral Zhao, sir, that’s genius,” Zuko assured him, filling his voice with as much admiration as he could. I’m going to murder you soon, he thought absently to appease his inner bloodlust. “You’re going to be a legend.”

“Thank you, Terong. That’s kind of you to say,” Zhao preened. “Now, you’re dismissed. Don’t forget to practice your firebending before we reach the North Pole. Before I kill the Moon Spirit, you’re going to be fighting many waterbenders in their natural habitat. Getting there isn’t going to be easy.”

Zuko nodded vigorously and strode from the room at a calm, average pace. He blanked his mind until he reached his bedroom, where he proceeded to panic. What can I possibly do now? he demanded of himself, pressing his face into a pillow. This is a disaster. I can’t let Zhao end waterbending. I have to stop him somehow. I… I have to follow him all the way to the North Pole. No one else knows about it. It’s all up to me. But there’s still no way I can pretend to be Terong all the way there, and I definitely can’t hide because if Terong suddenly goes missing, he’s important enough that they’ll turn the whole ship – no, the whole fleet upside down in search of him....

Unless they don’t think he’s aboard the ship at all.

Zuko took the rest of the day to subtly inspect the ship for weak spots and make a mental map of it. Then, that night, he took off the armor and uniform and folded it, leaving it on Terong’s pillow. He snuck down to the pantry and stole a suspicious and noticeable amount of food. He visited the cargo bay and stood above a small section that echoed oddly when his foot tapped against it. He carefully used his finger to burn thin lines in a large square into the section deep enough that the square was removable. He went back to the bedroom and collected all of Terong’s belongings. He carried them to the hallway, melted through a Terong-sized hole in the side of the ship, and tossed them overboard. He took his own belongings, including the money he’d stolen from Terong, to the cargo bay. He lifted the square. He climbed inside with his things, flattening himself uncomfortably on his stomach between the floor of the cargo bay and the floor of the extra layer in case of a firebending accident, and finally, he pulled the square back over him to cover it.

Hours later, his lips were tugged into a triumphant smirk as Zhao’s shriek echoed throughout the ship.

“What do you mean he abandoned ship?!”

That had to be Zuko’s absolute least favorite way to spend a two-day trip, but it got the job done. He felt the ship come to a stop and heard the men running off to attack the Northern Water Tribe. Now came the hardest part. He ensured that his knife and money were secure in his satchel, that his mask was secure on his face, and that his swords were secure on his back, and then, clutching his satchel tightly to his chest, he melted through the floor in front of him as fast as he could. Water rapidly rushed into the area surrounding him. Taking a deep breath, he dove into the water beneath the ship and swam one-handed out from under the ship, then up to the surface. In the chaos, those around him barely noticed his arrival, instead opting to fight for their lives against whoever was currently opposing them. He released his satchel, allowing it to hang at his side.

At first he ran for the center of the pole, having no other ideas about how to find the spirit oasis. Luckily, someone grabbed his arm and tugged him to the side. “Blue, is now really the time to kidnap Aang?” Suki teased, looking happy to see him. She frowned. "Why are you soaking wet?"

“Zhao’s going to the spirit oasis to kill the Moon Spirit,” Zuko gasped out without preamble, so relieved to see a friendly face that the words came spilling out of their own accord.

Her eyes widened. “Spirits. Okay, come with me.”

Suki led him swiftly through the ensuing battle, dodging between Fire Nation and Water Tribe soldiers alike. “Thanks for coming, Blue,” she called to him over the sounds of fire, water, and clashing weapons. “I mean, you didn’t have to stick your neck out just to save the Moon Spirit.”

“Yes, I did,” Zuko disagreed firmly.

Suki cast a grin over her shoulder at him. “Right. You are a good person, Blue. Even if you’ve got some weird obsession with kidnapping Aang. I’m sorry that I keep forgetting that.”

For a second Zuko thought she was mocking him, but her voice was entirely genuine. He didn’t understand how anyone could consider him a good person, especially knowing as little as she did of his reasons for hunting the Avatar. “You don’t have to be a good person to try and stop Zhao from killing the Moon Spirit. That’s just common decency.”

“You have a strange idea of ‘common,’” Suki shot back. Before he could answer, they reached a garden and pool surrounded by ice walls. “Here we are. And it looks like Zhao’s not here yet, either.”

“He won’t be for a while, hopefully. I don’t think he knows exactly where it is.”

Katara looked up from where she sat beside Sokka and Aang, the latter of whom appeared to be meditating while his tattoos glowed, along with a girl about Zuko’s age with striking silver hair. “You can’t move him,” Katara told Zuko immediately, placing a hand protectively on Aang’s knee. “He’s in the Spirit World – if you move him now, he might not be able to find his way back to his body.”

“You really think Suki would lead me right to Aang if I was here to kidnap him again?” Zuko retorted.

Katara blinked cat owlishly at him. “…I was talking to both of you… I was just letting you know.”

Before Zuko had the chance to feel sheepish about his defensiveness, Suki announced, “Blue said Zhao’s coming to kill the Moon Spirit.”

The unfamiliar girl shot straight up, looking alarmed. “No,” she gasped. “He can’t!”

“Not if we don’t let him,” Zuko agreed, unsheathing his swords.

“That’s if Zhao can even find this place,” Katara pointed out reasonably. “Am I wrong in thinking we’ve probably got a little time?”

“Probably not,” Suki conceded.

“So…, sit down, guys. Tell us how you found out.”

Suki plopped onto the ground next to Sokka, and Zuko followed suit more sedately on Suki’s other side. “How did you find out, Blue?”

“I impersonated a soldier aboard his ship and he told me himself.”

All of their jaws dropped. “You snuck onto Zhao’s ship?” Katara exclaimed.

“That’s terrifying,” the other girl breathed in shock.

Suki patted Zuko’s back, grinning ear-to-ear. “You, Blue, are a badass.”

“Why would you do that to begin with? You didn’t know about the Moon Spirit until after you impersonated one of his soldiers, right?” Sokka asked.

Zuko scowled. “Zhao needs to be taken care of once and for all. I… without my mask, I have history with Zhao. And a couple other very, very important people in the Fire Nation. And as you know, Suki, I have a pretty memorable face. June teamed up with Zhao to catch me and Aang, remember? She told him what I looked like, so now Zhao knows who I am, and after I got caught rescuing Aang – well. The Blue Spirit is now wanted. No more running around in public in this mask unless I want to start a riot. And now that he knows who I am, now that he has an excuse to imprison me, he’s never going to stop hunting me.”

“What did you do?” Katara inquired.

“…I can’t tell you that.”

“What? Why not?”

“I can’t tell you that either.”

An awkward silence fell over them as Suki, Katara, and Sokka were forcibly reminded of just how little they knew Zuko. Only Suki even knew his age. Eventually Sokka said, “By the way, man, I never got the chance to thank you for getting my boomerang. It’s really important to me. I actually took it from a Fire Nation soldier the day… uh…” He glanced at Katara, who smiled softly and bitterly and finished, “the day our mother died.”

Zuko didn’t know what to say to that. ‘Sorry for your loss’ and ‘My condolences’ seemed a little hollow. He slowly reached his hand into the pocket under his belt and retrieved his knife, holding it out in front of him. “My uncle gave me this when I was ten,” he revealed. “It was a souvenir from Ba Sing Se. He… His son died in the war. Four years later he killed himself. This is all I have left to remember him by.”

“How touching.” Zhao stepped into the oasis, followed by five Fire Nation soldiers, as Zuko, Suki, Sokka, and Katara leapt to their feet and readied themselves with their weapons. “It’s a shame you’re about to follow him.”

Suki dove into the fray, slashing one of her fans at a soldier who ducked under and counterattacked with a blast of fire. Zuko didn’t see what happened next because two soldiers threw themselves at him with a barrage of firebending. He quickly put the hilts of his swords together and twirled them in front of him, dispelling the fire. Then he swiped at both of them with either sword, forcing them backwards. One of them recovered faster than the other and lunged for him again, but Zuko ducked under their flames, sliced their shins, and used their back while they fell as a stepping stone to propel himself over the flames of the other soldier. He landed awkwardly on their other side, his right foot burned, and ducked as Sokka slammed his machete into the back of the soldier’s helmet. Zuko dodged around Sokka to swing his blades into the side of a soldier who faced Katara as she froze two fireballs in midair.

“That’s quite enough of that,” Zhao declared smugly. All four of them turned to him and saw him holding Yue by the back of her neck. “Unless you want the princess to die, you’ll surrender.”

“We can’t,” Suki whispered in horror.

“We have to,” Katara countered.

Zuko didn’t know what they should do, but when Katara let all of her water fall to the ground and Suki and Sokka followed suit with their weapons, he had no choice but to drop his swords. Maintaining his grip on Yue’s neck, Zhao forced her to her knees, knelt before her, and thrust his palm into the spirit oasis, searing the white fish. Zuko watched the sky in despair as the moon faded to red. Yue squeezed her eyes shut as she began to cry, either in fear or grief.

Then Zhao aimed that same palm at Aang.

“No!” Katara screamed, flinging her hands in a waterbending stance to no effect and then launching herself across the pool at him. Zuko drew his knife at once and threw it so that it landed in Zhao’s wrist. His fingers loosened, Yue threw herself forward onto her hands as Katara body-slammed Zhao away from her and Aang.

Zuko picked his swords back up and leapt over the pool just in time to push Katara out of the way of what could have been a fatal fire blast, catching it with just his left hip. He positioned himself between the two of them and snarled, “Don’t touch her – don’t touch any of them!” His pulse racing as his revenge neared completion, he slashed at Zhao’s head, feeling intensely satisfied as he cut the admiral’s cheek open.

Starting to look almost worried for the first time, Zhao gestured to his men. “We’ve done what we came here to do! The Avatar can wait!”

“You’re not getting away!” Zuko barked as his retreating back.

He made to go after them, but Suki caught him by his shoulder and yanked him back so she could face him. “Don’t be an idiot,” she snapped. “You’re injured! Blue, you’re limping, for spirits’ sake!”

Zuko looked down to see his right boot singed and a patch of his shirt on his left side seared right off. He looked back up, his pain dulled by adrenaline. “I have to go after him.”

“Live to fight another day,” she urged him.

“He killed the Moon Spirit!” Zuko shouted at her, incensed. “He killed my mother! He stabbed her in the chest, he twisted, and he left her there in that alley to bleed to death!” He shoved past her and ran from the spirit oasis.

It took only a few minutes to catch up to Zhao. He threw himself at Zhao, his swords aimed directly at the admiral’s chest, but he was knocked to the side by at least three different fireballs. The left side of his body tightening in agony, he fell limply to the ground, the intense pain hindering all attempts at movement. Zhao strode forward, lifted him two or three feet above the ground by the neck, and pressed his hand to Zuko’s mask. Zuko cried out in pain as his mask was set aflame, burning his face too and triggering phantom pain in his scar that blinded his left eye.

“Here you have it, soldiers,” Zhao sneered. “The banished prince, a proven traitor. The Fire Lord will be pleased with us, men,” he added to the three soldiers who had attacked Zuko. “You do know the penalty for treason, don’t you, prince?” He leaned forward and whispered menacingly in Zuko’s ear, “Death.” He threw Zuko backwards so that his head crashed into the ice. Zuko reached out with his right hand for the sword he’d dropped and half-heartedly swung it at Zhao, who laughed at him and easily disarmed him. “Clearly he’s still dangerous! What’s the most fitting death for a traitor, gentlemen? Fire? Drowning? Perhaps stabbing with his own sword? Yes, I like that one. That one has a nice ring to it.” He positioned Zuko’s sword so that the point rested lightly on Zuko’s chest, exactly where his mother had been stabbed by the man he'd hired. “Say hello to your mother and uncle for me, prince.”

The ocean itself reached out and plucked the sword from Zhao’s hand.

Zhao’s men screamed and ran. Zuko craned his neck to look dubiously at them and saw what they were running from; a large, dark blue blob with Aang and his glowing arrow tattoos at its core. Zhao backed away, but Aang rushed forward with an angry roar and scooped him up with one deformed water arm. Zuko watched in numb fascination as Zhao was absorbed into the water blob. The blob slowly reached out to Zuko, mimicking Aang’s own outstretched hand. Barely lucid, Zuko blearily lifted a heavy arm to reach back. As his fingertips brushed the wet surface of the arm, a cacophony of footsteps pounded up to Zuko. Aang’s head jerked up to look behind Zuko. Zuko’s arm fell. Aang roared again, an eerily deep and echoey noise that carried far too much weight for a thirteen-year-old. Then he reached out and brushed against Zuko’s forehead with the tip of his inflated ocean glove. Though his pain receded rapidly, so too did his consciousness. As the ocean rose and tugged him into its depths, the last thing he saw was a group of Fire Nation soldiers being crushed brutally with the Avatar’s supernatural wrath.

Chapter Text

Look at what I've become
Silly little monster
Should've just held my tongue

Numb by Meg Myers

Act 2: The Teamaker

Chapter 6: Silly Little Monster

As the ocean rose and tugged him into its depths, the last thing he saw was a group of Fire Nation soldiers being crushed brutally with the Avatar’s supernatural wrath.

The next thing Zuko saw when he opened his right eye was sand. Confusion washed over him at once. Sand? There’s no sand in the North Pole. Just ice. Bewildered, he blinked his eye a few times and gingerly pushed himself to his knees, his confusion doubling. Though his muscles were incredibly sore, they didn’t burn with nausea-inducing pain as part of him had expected them to. He took a good look at the left side of his body. No, he hadn’t imagined it; his clothes were charred all the way from his knee to his shoulder, barring the bare left side of his waist where his shirt had evidently been completely burned off. Yet there were no burns. Panic began bubbling up in his chest for some reason, rushing his heartbeat. Trying to ignore it for the time being, he looked for the cause.

He was kneeling on a large piece of driftwood that had washed up on a large, abandoned shore surrounded by a thick forest. He strained his ears, listening for footsteps, voices, breathing, or anything besides the sounds of the ocean gently lapping at his feet. He glanced to the right and turned his head to the left to thoroughly inspect his surroundings, but he didn’t see anything suspicious either. He had the strangest feeling that he was forgetting something, but apart from the steady incline of his heart rate, he hadn’t the slightest clue why. Hoping that the feeling would soon resolve itself, he stood on tenuous legs and moved towards the forest in the potential direction of some sort of civilization. Then the rhythm of the ocean waves falling onto the shore shifted ever so slightly in sound. Instinct rotated his neck so that his eye landed on something long, thin, and metallic washing ashore just as he had prior to waking up.

Sweating despite the chills running along his spine, he took a step forward, then another, then another. His soul sank deeper and deeper into dread as his heartbeat reached a crescendo unlike anything he’d ever felt before. Finally his legs gave out on him, sending him crashing to the ground beside the driftwood and the new object that had arrived on shore. It was a sword, a dao blade. Just one. Without even thinking about it, his numb, weightless hands flew to his face. Clammy skin pressed firmly against his cheeks, his forehead, his eyelids. No wood, just skin. No mask. No mask - !

It was hard to say how long he sat there in the sand, watching the ocean swallow the sun through his pale fingers. He didn’t want to move. He wasn’t sure he knew how to. His legs still felt weak, like he would need extra support to rise, and he couldn’t – he couldn’t move his hands. He couldn’t. They wouldn’t move, they shouldn’t move, they were exactly where they were supposed to be. His face was in a pile of ashes in the North Pole, and his hands were now the only things he had left. His one blade lay before him as half of a whole sword.

He wasn’t sure when he started hyperventilating and he wasn’t sure when he stopped, but sometime afterwards he finally found it in himself to lower his hands to the ground and push himself to his feet. He took a good, long look at the sword. He walked away from it towards the forest. He didn’t want half of his sword. He didn’t want to be half of himself. He’d rather be nothing at all.

At dawn, he finally stumbled into a marketplace. Only a few merchants were there, setting up their stalls, and each and every one of them dropped what they were doing and stared at Zuko. His hands returned to his face, but he dragged them back down so that they were at least only covering his mouth. (Like that was somehow better.) He realized then, as he walked through the mostly empty marketplace with all eyes on him, that he didn’t have a plan. He didn’t know what he was doing there. He didn’t know what he was looking for. Where did he go from there? Zhao was dead, probably, so he didn’t have to worry about that. Of course, the whole reason he’d wanted Zhao dead, apart from the murder of his mother, was so that he could go more or less free as the Blue Spirit. Now the Blue Spirit was –

His next thought was the Avatar. Capture the Avatar and go home. That was still the plan, of course it was. Why wouldn’t it be? If he was going to capture the Avatar, he’d need to go get his boat and his ostrich horse, Dao. He’d need his food supply, his feed supply, his swords –

Zuko staggered over to an empty stall and leaned against it, grounding himself. Focus. He had to focus. Forget about long-term plans – what did he need then and there? A soft breeze pointed out an obvious necessity; new clothes. But he didn’t have any money for clothes. But wait, he did. He’d stolen plenty of money from the Terong kid who he’d impersonated. Zuko had never actually counted the money he’d gained from that, but he would be willing to bet that the same circumstances which had led to him interning under someone like Admiral Zhao had also led to him possessing an extraordinary amount of pocket change. Sure enough, when he went through the money pouch that was miraculously still tied to his belt, there was almost half as much money as he’d made from that bounty on the murderer Hao in Chin Village so long ago.

A bit calmer now that he’d figured out step one, Zuko walked more purposely through the marketplace, looking for a clothing vendor who was already open. When he found one, he gritted his teeth, forced his hands to fall to his side, and approached to investigate the wares. He tried his hardest to ignore the merchant’s blatant staring. However, the merchant actually spoke up before he settled on some clothes. “Young man, I don’t mean to pry, but is your eye okay? If you need medical assistance, I can point you in the direction of a pretty good healer who should be opening up soon.”

Zuko nearly snapped at the man for his rudeness. Obviously his scar was as healed as it was getting. Anyone with two eyes could see –

Wait a second.

Wait a second.

After a few seconds of intense, confused internal struggling, Zuko finally opened his left eye for the first time since the North Pole. “Thank you for your concern, but I’m fine,” he muttered. He quickly picked out a cheap but practical outfit and paid. The merchant looked pretty alarmed to receive Fire Nation money, but he accepted it without comment all the same, and that was all Zuko cared about. He found a nice, private corner of the marketplace between two buildings in which to change. Thankfully, it was still pretty early in the morning, so he wasn’t too worried about someone straying closer to him. He wasn’t quite sure what to do with what was left of his old clothes, so he stuffed the scraps into his money pouch.

He went back to the marketplace to inquire as to this village’s whereabouts and discovered he was about six days’ journey from the town where he’d left Dao – or at least, he would be with an ostrich horse or a boat. He’d probably be lucky to get there in two weeks on foot. He wondered for just how long he had been unconscious on that drift wood after Zhao’s invasion of the Northern Water Tribe. The smartest thing would be to buy another ostrich horse, but he wasn’t going to leave Dao with some stranger unless he absolutely had to, and he didn’t know what he’d do with a second ostrich horse once he had Dao back. In any case, he had to eat no matter what, and he had to have somewhere to put the food when he wasn’t eating it other than his arms, and he had to have somewhere to sleep, too. He purchased a sleeping bag and a messenger bag and as much food as he could feasibly keep in the latter bag without tiring himself out excessively. He honestly had no idea what to do next, because that depended on whether he prioritized capturing the Avatar or returning to Dao. It was nearing dusk at that point, though, so he set aside his plans and lack thereof for the night and went into the forest in search of a suitable clearing to set up camp in.

“Zuzu. Zuzu, wake up. Wake up, dum-dum.”

Zuko blinked blearily at the familiar voice, baffled and wary before he could even figure out why. When he recognized the voice, he shot straight up and leapt out of his sleeping bag. “…Azula?”

She lifted her hands to shoulder level on either side of her, palms facing the sky. “The one and only.”

“What are you doing here?” he demanded.

“So rude. A ‘hello’ back would have been nice.”

“…Hello.”

Azula sighed. “I see your years away from home haven’t improved your manners.”

“How would they?” he retorted. “Home was more civilized than anywhere I’ve been since.”

“Fair enough. As it so happens, that brings me to my reason for coming. I’m sure you didn’t think this was a social call.”

“I’ve never known you to make one of those.”

“Yes, you’re absolutely right. I’ve come with a message from Father. He’s decided that family is more important now than ever before. He’s heard rumors, you see, of a plot to overthrow him. He’s realized that family is the only thing you can trust, the only thing you can truly rely on. He regrets your banishment, and he wants you home.”

Zuko’s heart leapt into his throat. “…He… home…?”

“Yes, brother. Home.” She seemed quite amused with his reaction. “Well? Are you coming?”

“What? You mean, now?”

“Well, why not? What’s stopping you? My ship is waiting for us nearby.”

“This is all so sudden.” Zuko stared at her. “I don’t know what to say.”

Azula huffed. “Why must you overthink everything? A simple ‘thank you’ would suffice, or just a ‘yes,’ or even just a nod.”

“You’ll have to forgive me if I find this hard to believe,” Zuko retorted. “Father doesn’t generally change his mind.”

“Well, he made an exception,” Azula snapped. “Why are you being so obstinate about this? If you’d rather continue living like some common peasant, then by all means, continue. I won’t stop you.” She glared at him for a few seconds. “I’m going to count to ten. If you haven’t started packing by the time I’m done, then I’ll leave you here to find your own way home when you come to your senses. I didn’t come all this way just for you to reject Father and me out of paranoia.”

“Alright, alright,” Zuko grumbled. “Thank you, Azula. I appreciate you coming to get me.” Something still felt off, but he could hardly turn down the chance to go home without having to derail Aang’s life in the process.

Azula smiled benignly, or at least as benignly as Azula could possibly smile. “It was my pleasure, brother. Little though I expected it, I found your frequent inane comments and naïve short-sightedness to be preferable to boredom after some time. I won’t mind having you home again too much.”

Zuko quickly packed his things up, ignoring Azula’s disparaging commentary (“What are you going to do with that? We have plenty of food at home. That sleeping bag is terrible quality, you can pick up a better one at home if you decide to go camping.”) They headed to the shore in companionable silence, and within a few hours they were boarding a Fire Nation war ship even more impressive than Zhao’s. The soldiers aboard the ship stopped what they were doing to salute both Azula and Zuko, a sign of respect that thoroughly jarred the latter.

Azula led him to the bridge, where the captain awaited them. “Are we ready to depart, your Highness?”

Azula exchanged an almost excited glance with Zuko, whose insides were writhing with joy and fear. “Set a course for home, Captain.”

The captain nodded and turned to face the rest of the crew. “You heard the princess! Raise the anchors! We’re taking the prisoner home!”

Zuko reacted at once, knocking the captain off of the ship with a well-aimed kick and removing each of the guards who charged him with a quick blast of firebending each in rapid succession until it was just him and Azula on the ship. “You’re so gullible, Zuzu,” she crooned, entirely unfazed by this turn of events. “I almost had you, too.”

“Why?” he demanded, facing her with his back straight and his chin high. “After all these years, why now? What changed? I at least deserve an explanation.”

“You don’t deserve a damn thing, but I’m feeling generous, so I’ll tell you anyway. Father knows you sided with the Northern Water Tribe in the late Admiral Zhao’s invasion of the North Pole. You were seen fighting him by several of the surviving soldiers. In light of that, Father’s decided you can’t be trusted to roam the world freely anymore and must be imprisoned so that you can no longer actively impede our soldiers.”

“You don’t understand,” Zuko implored, willing her to hear him. “Zhao was trying to kill the Moon Spirit.”

“…And?”

“If the Moon Spirit dies, the whole world falls out of balance,” Zuko burst out frustratedly. “It won’t be bad for just the Water Tribes. It’ll be bad for the Fire Nation too! The sun can’t exist without the moon. Firebenders can’t exist without waterbenders. The world needs balance.”

Azula cackled. “You sound just like Uncle! He always rambled on and on about spirits and balance, but it’s not like either of you ever had any proof. It’s just a hunch. You betrayed your own people on a hunch. That’s treason, in case you’ve forgotten, and former Crown Prince or not, it will be treated as such. You may as well come quietly.”

Zuko reacted the only way he knew how to; he hit her with as much fire as he could put into one blast and he made a run for it back towards the town. It wasn’t until he stumbled across his campsite that he realized there were no footsteps behind him. Azula had chosen not to give chase. He had to assume she was letting him go now because she couldn’t take him in a head-on fight and imprison him; she would be far more likely to kill him whether she meant to or not. At least this means Father wants me alive, he thought bitterly. Unlike Mother.

He kept going at a slightly more sedate pace for a few more hours, just in case Azula was still after him. Once he felt even remotely safe, he dropped his things unceremoniously on the ground and collapsed heavily onto a large rock. He hadn’t ever been so confused and uncertain for as long as he could remember. Even if he captured the Avatar, now, it wouldn’t make a lick of difference. He couldn’t make a lick of difference. He had failed to save the Moon Spirit, although somehow Aang and his friends must have cleaned up his mess for it had shone in the sky last night. He had failed over and over and over again to capture the Avatar, to restore his honor and reclaim his birthright, and now there was no chance for him to ever go home and help anyone. The entire war was completely out of his hands now. It would spiral further and further out of control and he would sit there and watch it the way an ant watched a breaking dam.

He was not unlike a breaking dam himself. The future he’d worked so hard for over the past few months, the future he’d dreamt of against his better judgment for years, was gone, dissipating before his eyes like mist in the sunlight. The future he’d resigned himself to as the infamous Blue Spirit was gone too. The Blue Spirit was dead. The Blue Spirit was dead and the Crown Prince of the Fire Nation was dead. And, Agni help him, as much as he’d promised himself that everything he did was for the right reasons, he wanted to go home so badly. He wanted his family back. Hell, he wanted any family at this point. Now he was a wanted man with no allies, no mask, no Dao, no swords –

Oh, but he did. He had half of a sword, and that was all he needed. He left his sleeping bag and his food in the forest and returned to the marketplace. There, he found a vendor to purchase minimal, basic writing supplies from and scribbled, ‘Thank you,’ on some parchment. He opened his satchel and dumped a bit of money into it, enough to substantially lessen the weight of his money pouch, and then he rented a messenger hawk and sent it off with the letter and the money.

It was nearly nightfall then, so the moon was high in the sky by the time Zuko returned to the shore he’d washed up on. He couldn’t imagine who would have moved it or why they would do such a thing, so it didn’t come as any surprise that the driftwood and the sword were still exactly where he’d left them. For someone whose life had just fallen apart completely in every way imaginable, he felt oddly tranquil. Father wants me home alive? he thought, kneeling in front of his sword. Too fucking bad. He laid his left forearm on the ground, palm up. He picked up his sword with his other hand. He put the blade to his wrist, and he pressed down.

Chapter Text

I will never feel anything else
Until my wounds are healed
I will never be anything
'Till I break away from me

Somewhere I Belong by Linkin Park

Act 2: The Teamaker

Chapter 7: Break Away From Me

“I really don’t want you in the room alone with him.”

“But he’s unconscious! What’s he gonna do to me?”

“Well, ideally, he’s going to wake up at some point.”

“Whatever. Even if he does wake up, why would he hurt me?”

“People do strange and unpredictable things when they wake up in unfamiliar surroundings.”

“So I’ll keep him at arm’s length, then!”

“The answer is no, Lee, and that’s final.”

Zuko stared blankly at the ceiling as a door opened. In the now-open doorway, a woman inhaled sharply. “Oh! You’re awake! How are you feeling?”

How was he feeling? His soreness from his fight with Zhao was almost nonexistent, probably from sleeping in a real bed. Zuko lifted his left arm and observed his bandaged wrist with a sort of detached curiosity. A peculiar divide had arisen seemingly overnight, a vast expanse yawning between him and the physical sensations in his wrist - and the rest of him, for that matter. Try as he might (though the concept of trying seemed strangely nebulous to him at the moment), the distance was simply too great to cross. He did not say any of this to the unfamiliar woman in whose house he'd inexplicably awoken, however. Instead, he said, "Okay."

“Well, that’s better than it could be,” the woman remarked. “You lost a lot of blood, but it’s been a couple days and you should be able to stand now. My name is Sela, by the way.” She looked at him expectantly.

“…Xin.”

“Well, Xin, you can join my family and me for lunch, or I can bring it to you so you can eat in here. It’s entirely up to you.” Zuko considered her for a few moments. Part of him wanted to be alone, but if he wasn’t sorely mistaken, this woman and her family had saved his life and provided him shelter, and now they were providing him food as well. The polite thing to do would probably be to at least eat that food with them. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood, eliciting a pleased smile from Sela. She led him to the dining table, where a man and a young boy already knelt.

While Sela set a place for him, the boy exclaimed, “You’re up! Hello! My name’s Lee. What’s your name?”

“…Uh, Xin.”

“Where are you from?”

“…Uh, around. I… travel. A lot.”

“That’s so cool! Why do you travel so much? Are you in a traveling circus? Are you - ”

“Lee, that’s enough,” the man reprimanded. “Hello, Xin. My name is Gansu. It’s very nice to meet you.”

“You too,” Zuko replied.

Sela sat down again and they began to eat. Zuko was surprisingly hungry – although maybe that wasn’t so surprising. He had gone from several weeks of barely eating to at least a few days unconscious to two days of barely eating again to another few days of unconsciousness. Still, he did his best not to eat too quickly. He knew the risks of gorging himself on food when he wasn’t used to it. “Hey Xin, where’d you get that sword?” Lee asked. “It’s super cool.”

Both Sela and Gansu flinched, and that was when Zuko knew that they both knew exactly what he’d done with that sword. However, he found himself unperturbed by the mention of it, even the reminder of what he’d lost in the North Pole. “It was a gift from the man who taught me how to use it, as a reward for completing my training under him.”

All three of them looked at him in surprise. “Whoa,” Lee breathed. His whole face lit up. “Ooh, ooh, could you teach me?!”

“Uh….” Zuko glanced nervously at Lee’s parents, who seemed rather bemused. “Maybe… Maybe later.”

“Okay!”

“So Xin, tell me about yourself,” Sela invited.

“…Like what?”

“Lee, hush,” Sela told her snickering son. “What do you for fun?”

“…I…” Zuko searched himself for answers. When was the last time he’d done something for fun? “I… make tea, sometimes.”

“That’s not fun,” Lee objected.

“Lee, hush,” Sela repeated more enthusiastically. “Making tea is absolutely fun.”

“Whatever.” Lee finished his food and got up. “I’m going to Bonoh’s house, okay?”

“Wait a second – “

“That’s fine, dear,” Sela interrupted her husband. “Be back by dinnertime, okay?”

“Yes, Mom!” Lee scampered off.

Sela turned to Zuko. “Would you mind bringing some of these dishes to the kitchen please? I’ll be out in just a moment with the rest of them, and I’ll show you our tea-making supplies.”

Zuko knew a dismissal when he heard one. He nodded and collected as many of the dishes as he could carry before transporting them to the kitchen. He hesitated, unsure of what would be considered the most polite course of action, before determining that washing the dishes couldn’t possibly be construed as rude. As he was halfway through, he heard Sela exclaim, “Oh, you didn’t have to do all that!”

“You cooked,” Zuko pointed out mildly.

Sela smiled. “Well, you’re not wrong. Still, I didn’t mean to put you to work as soon as you woke up.” Zuko shrugged. She set the dirty dishes on a nearby surface and laid a hand on Zuko’s busy arm, tugging him gently away from his task. “Come on, let’s make some tea. What’s your favorite kind?”

“Don’t have one,” he grunted.

She gave him a strange look. “Really?” He nodded. “Well, let’s just make jasmine tea, then. That’s what I have the most of right now anyway.” They set the jasmine tea up to steep for a while and sat in a couple of nearby chairs. “Xin, do you have any friends or family - ?”

“No,” he answered bluntly, sensing where this was going. “Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself. I’ll be out of your hair by tonight.”

“Now just hang on a moment – do you even know how to change the bandage on your wrist?”

“…No.”

“As it so happens, I do, being the one who bandaged your wrist to begin with. You might be perfectly capable of walking around and washing dishes, but your wrist is by no means healed yet. I can’t force you to stay, but I would consider it extremely unwise to go off on your own at least until your wrist has healed a little more.”

“I can’t pay you. I have no money.”

Sela gave him a look that was somewhere between pitying and sympathetic, but still too pitying for his liking. “I didn’t ask you for money.”

“I don’t want your charity.”

“I’m not offering you charity. Gansu’s back has been acting up lately. If you help him out on the farm for a few days, I’ll consider us even.”

“You’re giving me food, shelter, and medical aid,” Zuko countered disbelievingly. “That’s not even close to even.”

“It’s even enough for me,” Sela disagreed simply. “I am not in the habit of finding young men bleeding to death from obviously self-inflicted wounds and casting them off to do what they like afterwards. You’re no hostage here but you are a welcome guest. Besides, neither Gansu nor Lee likes tea.”

“I don’t like tea,” Zuko muttered mutinously. “I just like making it.”

“Perfect. I like drinking it.” She rose from her seat and patted him on the shoulder. “I’ll finish up the dishes and you finish up the tea, okay? Whether you like tea or not, I fully expect you to have a cup with me afterwards.” She strode towards the other side of the kitchen where the dishes awaited her. Zuko still wasn’t completely sure what had just happened, but no matter what Sela said, this seemed an awful lot like a hostage situation.

That night, after attempting to assist Gansu in the farm and inevitably getting in the way and receiving the promise of a proper lesson the following day, Zuko retired to the room that was, for the time being, his lodgings. He hadn’t expected his sword to be waiting there for him, since Sela and Gansu seemed pretty determined to keep him alive for whatever reason. Its absence still disappointed him, but only slightly. In fact, all of his emotions, even his anger, had been strangely subdued all day, like they were each hovering in perpetuity on the precipice of sleep. He wondered if it was residual from the blood loss of the day before.

He was getting into bed when he heard something heavy fall right outside. It wasn’t exactly his place to go investigate, but there were no voices and no footsteps throughout the house. Perhaps he was the only one still awake. If these people were taking care of him, he really should investigate potentially suspicious activity so close to them. He got right back out of bed and walked out of the house to discover Lee swinging his sword around. He wasn’t quite sure how to feel about that, and his mind and body had apparently decided to cease sending him any pertinent indications, so he called out calmly, “You’re holding it wrong,” and was rewarded with the kid jumping out of his skin and accidentally releasing the sword, sending it flying into a branch.

“I’m so sorry - I can explain - please don’t tell my parents!” Lee begged him, actual tears forming in the corners of his eyes.

“Tell you what. If your parents say it’s okay, I’ll teach you a little bit tomorrow after I work on the farm with your father. Okay? And I won’t tell them about this.”

“Thank you so much! You’re the best, Xin!” Lee squealed, throwing his arms around Zuko’s waist and pressing his head into Zuko’s chest. Bemused, Zuko stood there awkwardly with his hands in the air until Lee released him and bounded back inside without the sword, not noticing anything strange about Zuko’s behavior. Zuko slowly walked up to his sword, amazed by the boy’s carelessness. Then again, it didn’t seem like his parents had revealed the nature of his injury to their son. It briefly crossed his mind to take the sword and finish the job, but more likely than not Sela would find him and fix him back up before he bled to death, and he would only succeed in costing this family more time and supplies. Besides, he’d made a promise, and he was a man of his word.

That was how he ended up giving Lee a lesson on the proper way to hold the sword the next day, just after his short but thorough first lesson in farming. If he had both swords, or even just a second sword, he would have shown Lee how to use them together. As it was, he decided to teach Lee as though the blade constituted a whole weapon instead of a measly half of one. Sela had been reluctant to let Lee learn until Gansu had pointed out he would never have the chance to put the skills he was building into action, so it was virtually harmless. Now she stood in the doorway watching them with growing fascination and curiosity.

“Would you like to try?” he offered on a whim.

She started and shook her head. “Thank you, but that’s not really something for a woman to do, is it?” Before he could tell her exactly how ridiculous a notion that was, she scurried away into the house. Zuko shrugged and returned to his pupil.

The neighbors cast intrigued glances at them throughout the first, second, and third lessons. By the fourth, two of Lee’s friends wandered over and started mimicking him. Sela spoke to their parents on Zuko’s behalf, and suddenly he had a class of three with parental permission.

By the end of his first week there, the class size had grown to five. One kid’s mother, Lavon, came early to pick her daughter up. “Hello,” she said to him, which was new. People didn’t go out of their way to talk to him. He supposed he did give off a bit of a loner vibe, which he had, of course, been cultivating since before his mother had died. The kids’ parents tended to go to Sela or Gansu if they wanted to talk about the ‘class’ that Zuko taught.

Zuko blinked at her a few times. “…Hi.” She seemed perturbed by his lack of enthusiasm for the conversation, so he tried to think of a way to remedy the situation. “…Er…, would you like some tea?”

“Oh!” Lavon smiled, more relaxed now. “That would be lovely.” She followed him through the house to the kitchen and sat at one of the chairs while he brewed the tea. While it steeped, he considered finding some busy work that would prevent him from having to sit down and interact with her, but then she started talking again, and it seemed that the politer thing to do would be to sit down and interact with her. “Holi seems to be doing well,” she remarked, referring to her daughter.

“Yes, she is. She has surprising muscle coordination for someone so young. She’s taken to all this like a turtleduck to water.” He kept an eye on the five of them through the window. They were still practicing the form he’d taught them just before Lavon arrived.

“Oh, really? That's nice to hear, but it’s actually not what I was referring to. Holi doesn’t spend a lot of time with children her own age. It’s nice to see her getting along with her peers.”

“Really? I couldn’t tell at all. I’m glad to hear it’s having some impact beyond more realistic fake fights with tree branches.”

Lavon chuckled. “I’m glad too. I appreciate what you’re doing here – babysitting these rascals and teaching them how to defend themselves and facilitating their friendships all at the same time. It doesn’t seem right that you’re doing it for free, though.” She reached into her purse and retrieved a small pouch which she placed on the table.

Zuko took a second to understand what she was saying. “Oh – no, I couldn’t possibly – “

“I want you to take it. Really.”

He considered rejecting the money again, since it wasn’t really taking anything out of him to teach the other kids while he was teaching Lee anyway, but then he remembered that he still owed Sela and Gansu and that he was still more of a hindrance than a help on the farm, so he forced a smile and nodded, resolving to hand the money directly to his hosts. “Thank you.”

The next day, Sela approached him with an idea. “There’s a few Earthbenders in this town, but not many, and none of the nonbenders really know how to fight. It would be good to be able to defend ourselves, you know, just in case trouble comes our way. I’m sure many people would pay quite well for these lessons too.”

“What is anyone going to do with sword-fighting lessons?” Zuko pointed out rationally. “Like I told Lavon yesterday, those kids are just using them to have better fake fights.”

“I’m willing to bet you know more about fighting than just swords,” Sela guessed. “Sword-fighting skill has to be built on something, doesn’t it? I heard you tell the kids the other day that the sword is an extension of the arm. Couldn’t someone take the lessons you’re teaching about sword-fighting and apply it to hand-to-hand combat nearly as effectively?”

“That’s true.” Zuko cocked his head to the side. “Alright, I’ll teach this class on one condition; you attend it. You said it yourself; it’s good to be able to defend yourself in case of an emergency, and unless I’m missing something, you’re a nonbender. So you should learn too.”

Sela agreed, so in the following afternoon, Zuko ventured into the marketplace for the first time with Gansu. The two of them put flyers up for his new class. By the end of his second week with this family, he had a group of fifteen people paying him so they could watch and mimic his movements while sparring and receive his criticism. By the end of the third week, he was holding three classes a day to fit everyone. It was then that he noticed that he was never sent to the marketplace by himself despite knowing it well enough and that he was never there for too long at a time. He confronted Sela and Gansu immediately. “I don’t understand. You trust me to be alone in your house with your son and all of your possessions, but you don’t trust me to go shopping?”

“It’s not about you, Xin,” Gansu hastily reassured him. “It’s about the guards.”

“What about the guards?” Zuko demanded, still feeling a little hostile.

Sela and Gansu exchanged looks. “They’re supposed to be protecting us from the Fire Nation, but all they do is bully everyone around town,” Gansu confessed. “I think it’s for the best that you don’t meet them.”

“Why not?”

“To be honest, Xin,” Sela broke in bluntly, “you’re not especially diplomatic, and they're very easily offended.”

Zuko scowled. Even he couldn’t disagree with the first point, but it didn’t mean he had to like it. “Yeah, well, maybe diplomacy is overrated, especially when it comes to authority figures that need to be taken down a notch.”

“No,” Gansu disagreed firmly. “This is why we didn’t tell you, Xin! It’s not a big enough deal for you to get in trouble over it. Just leave it.”

“Fine.”

In the end, it didn’t matter. Zuko had no choice in whether or not to confront the guards because they stopped by the house and approached him in the middle of him teaching the group of kids. They watched for quite a while without saying anything, so finally Zuko turned to them. “Would you like some tea?” That was usually the safest thing to say to someone, he’d learned. No one he’d met in that town had reacted poorly to a proffered cup of tea.

One of them laughed, probably the leader if the submissive body language of his three friends was anything to go by. “No thanks, stranger. I heard you’ve been staying with this family for a few weeks now. Since you’re new in town, let me explain how things work around here. My name’s Gow. This is Mer, Cho, and Raoti. We’re the guards who protect this town, but keeping all of you defenseless villagers safe is hard work. Makes a man hungry, you know what I mean? So as thanks, most villagers give us some food or something like that as payment.”

I’m not most villagers, Zuko thought automatically, more because it was the kind of thing that Zuko would respond with than out of any actual spite. He waited for the familiar sensation of anger burning in his chest, but there was nothing there. Nothing at all. In the end, these people were ants, just like him. None of them mattered anymore. The world was ending and none of them mattered. He should, maybe, have stood up for himself. That would have been a Zuko thing to do. But the Crown Prince was dead, and the Blue Spirit was dead, and his name was Xin. So he nodded. “Sorry, didn’t realize. I’ll be sure to start doing that,” he answered monotonously.

The guard nodded back, pleased. “Your cooperation is greatly appreciated,” he promised smugly, patting the hammer hanging by his waist in a way that he probably thought was subtle. He and the other guards strode away.

Of course it couldn’t be that easy. Nothing ever was. The following morning, Lee was missing when the three of them woke up. They only had a few seconds to panic, because one of Gow’s men, Cho, swaggered up to them as they exited the house to split up and look for him. “Looking for that little brat?” he sneered. “He came at Gow with a sword. I think it was yours, stranger.” He gestured to Zuko with his chin. “If the kid’s old enough to fight, he’s old enough to join the army. So that’s where he’ll be off to first thing tomorrow morning. Just thought you deserved to know.”

Sela burst into tears, throwing herself into Gansu’s arms and pressing her face into his chest. “What are we going to do?” she sobbed. “We can’t lose Lee too…!”

Now there was something in Zuko’s chest – not anger, precisely, but something cool and dark that was out for blood. “You’re not going to do anything,” he told them. “I’m going to get him back. Tonight.”

True to his word, he snuck out of the house in the dead of night with a pair of kitchen blades. It wasn’t much, but hopefully it would at least be enough to get Lee out safely. And himself. Maybe. He hadn’t quite decided yet. He crept through the darkness to the guard station. He wasn’t sure if that was where Lee would be, but it was as good a place as any to start. When he got there, a lamp in the back ignited. Cho blew out his match. Gow and the other two stood beside Lee, who was tied up. “Hello, Zuko,” Gow barked at him, grinning. He unrolled a piece of paper: a wanted poster with Zuko’s face on it. “This look familiar?”

“What do you want?” Zuko growled.

“Simple. Hand yourself over, and we’ll release the boy. If not….” He stomped the ground and curled his tightly-clenched fist into his shoulder, earthbending a large piece of ground into the air above Lee’s head. “I can’t promise this rock won’t just… fall.” He laughed like he’d said something hilarious. Clearly he’d never met Azula, who was doubly as amusing and four times as terrifying.

Still, while the other three guards looked like idiots who barely knew a blade from a hilt judging by their fighting stances, Gow did look at least mildly threatening. Zuko didn’t know how much training he’d had, he didn’t know how powerful an earthbender he was, and he didn’t know how much his threat was worth. With any of those three factors in question, it was too dangerous to risk Lee by fighting him, especially with a pair of knives instead of real swords. Zuko threw the knives to the ground. “Fine. Let him go.”

They released Lee, who ran up to Zuko and stood beside him, facing the guards instead of leaving. “I won’t leave you,” he protested, getting into his own fighting stance despite his shaking. “I won’t let them take you.”

“Lee, go,” he muttered. Lee glared at him and shook his head. Zuko glared back with twice as much force. “Lee, GO!” Lee flinched. Biting his lip as tears formed in his eyes, he turned and ran from the station.

Gow earthbended a pair of columns from the ground to encase both his hands, trapping him there. “That was a good answer,” he declared patronizingly. “See, the girl who's looking for you - Azula? She’s already on her way here with company. So it wouldn’t have mattered whether you said yes or not.” He clapped Zuko on the shoulder. “That’s something, right?”

Zuko grunted noncommittally.

“Raoti, stay here,” Gow ordered. “Keep an eye on the prisoner. Mer will come by to relieve you in three hours.” Gow, Cho, and Mer left. Raoti sat in a chair nearby and started reading a book, paying no attention to Zuko whatsoever and completely defeating the purpose of his being there. Zuko could easily take him out with a blast of firebending from one of his feet, which Gow had left free in a show of spectacular short-sightedness, but even if Raoti wasn’t there, Zuko had no way of escaping from the earth that chained him down.

He had just begun to come to terms with his fate when he heard footsteps behind him - lots of them, happening very quickly. Raoti shot to his feet in alarm, but soon three of Zuko’s students had burst in and attacked him, easily overpowering him between their power in numbers and their tutelage at Zuko’s hands. “Hold still,” someone shouted in his ear, and two hammers hit the earth on each side of him with enough force to shatter the bindings. Another pupil stood on his left while Gansu stood on his right. “Are you hurt?” Gansu demanded.

“I’m – I’m fine,” Zuko answered, startled.

“Good. Then you can fight.” He grinned sharply at Zuko. “We’re taking back this town once and for all. Coming?”

“Of course.”

The two of them, followed closely by his four students once Raoti was tied up properly, ran outside. The fighting was over already. With the sheer number of people who had come to overthrow the guards, Gow stood no chance even with his earthbending. Soon all four of the guards were in a pile, tied to each other in a well and truly debilitating way. Sela strode forward, her face dark with the wrath of a vengeful mother. “Let me make this clear,” she hissed. “You four just got your asses handed to you by a bunch of nonbenders. When I untie you, you’re gonna scram, and you’re never gonna show your faces in this town again. Do you hear me?”

“Yes,” Gow gasped. “We’ll never come back, I swear!”

“Good.”

Sela stood. She and a couple others untied them, and the four of them streaked out of the town. As the villagers began cheering, Zuko felt his heart sink. In all the commotion, he’d forgotten something very important. Azula was on her way. He turned to Gansu, something like regret sticking in his throat like a rock. “Gansu.”

“Yeah?” Gansu turned to him, smiling bigger than Zuko had ever seen, but his smile evaporated when he saw Zuko’s face. “What happened?”

“I have to go.”

Gansu’s jaw dropped. “What? What do you mean? We just got the town back - !”

“It’s not about that,” Zuko snapped. “It’s about me, and… the person I was before I got here. Just – meet me back at the house with Sela, okay?”

“…Okay,” Gansu agreed reluctantly. “Don’t do anything stupid before we get there!”

“I won’t.”

Zuko returned to their house (Not mine, he thought miserably. The closest thing I’ve ever had, but still not mine.) and found Lee sitting on the floor leaning against a wall in the front of the house, snoring lightly. He smiled bitterly and continued on to the room he’d slept in for the past three weeks to begin packing. When he was finished, he was drawn back to Lee by a painful twist in his gut, so he settled down next to the kid and waited. Sela and Gansu soon arrived. “What’s this about leaving?” Sela demanded. “I mean, I – “ Her face fell, insecurity and disappointment open in her eyes. “I can’t expect you to stay forever, but this is so sudden – “

“It’s not about that,” Zuko repeated wearily as Lee shifted beside him and rubbed his eyes. “Listen, there’s something you need to know. My name isn’t Xin. It’s Zuko. The truth is, I’m wanted. I’m a wanted man. By the Fire Nation, specifically a girl named Azula. She’s young, but she’s so, so dangerous. And she’s on her way here now. Gow sent her a messenger hawk telling her he’d caught me. That’s why he took Lee in the first place.”

“Oh, no,” Sela breathed. She looked around wildly as if she could summon an answer through desperation alone. “There must be... no. You can’t go. There has to be another way.”

“Sela, there isn’t,” Zuko told her softly, willing her to understand. “I have to go, before you three get caught in the crossfire between the two of us.” Literally.

“We’ll go with you,” Lee burst out, sniffling.

“You can’t.” Zuko shook his head. “It isn’t safe, Lee.”

“So? You taught me how to fight! You taught us all how to fight! We can keep each other safe!”

“Azula is a firebender, Lee. She’s one of the most powerful firebenders in the world. Her fire burns so hot that it turns blue. Lee, she bends lightning.”

“So what will you do?” Sela asked, tears running down her cheeks. “How will you escape from her?”

“They want me alive,” Zuko answered grimly. “She can’t apprehend me herself without killing me. So I’ll start running and I won’t stop running. And when she gets here, you tell her everything, okay? Nothing you know about me is worth lying to her. She can tell. She can always tell.”

Sela and Gansu knelt in front of him and Lee and pulled the two of them into a tight, emotional group hug. Zuko awkwardly participated, gingerly putting one arm around Gansu and the other around Lee. When everyone pulled away, Sela took Zuko’s hands in hers. “Come back to us, okay?”

“How – ?”

“I don’t care how. You find a way, and you do it, okay? Someday, someday when it’s safe, you come back to us. That day will come. It has to. We have to believe it will. So don’t you dare give up, Xin, or Zuko, or whatever your real name is!”

“I’ll never give up without a fight,” Zuko promised reluctantly, again going unspoken but hanging in the air between them.

Sela packed up some food, tea, and money to send with him in a backpack with a small pot and two cups as well, ignoring his weak protests. Zuko walked out of the house, walked out of the town, and didn’t let himself look back.

Zuko didn’t know what he was doing. Confusion was becoming an all too familiar feeling to him, and he didn’t like it at all. Without that family, he was just as purposeless as he had been three weeks ago. The only difference was that he carried the crushing weight of his promise to Sela now. He briefly considered going back up north to retrieve Dao, but the ostrich horse was probably much happier where he was than he ever would be or, indeed, ever had been with Zuko. His next thought was to look for the Avatar and his friends again simply out of habit, but he would just endanger them the way he’d endangered that family.

He wondered just how much of a fight he had to put up in order to fulfill his promise. He would run out of food eventually, and he couldn’t very well show his face in a town when his face was on wanted posters. Surely Sela wouldn’t have wanted him to steal from someone in order to secure his own survival. At this rate, whether he liked it or not, he wasn’t sure he was capable of preventing himself from starving to death at some point. There was nothing for him to do, nowhere for him to go, no one for him to go to. The more he thought about it, the more he felt that no matter how you looked at it the only thing left in his future was death.

But a promise was a promise. Tonight, he would keep breathing. He set up camp for the day despite the early time, exhausted from having been up all night. He’d walked for all this time in honor of his promise, aware of Azula somewhere in the distance behind him, but he had been awake for so long and he thought that maybe if he took a break now and it got him captured, it could still count.

He was just about to start eating when he heard someone stomping nearby, too loudly for him to justify ignoring. However, no sooner had he risen from the ground than he was thrown across the camp by the ground itself. Groaning, he lifted his head to see a young girl scowling suspiciously at nothing in particular. The two of them sat there in tense silence for quite a while. Then Zuko decided, dangerous though she obviously was, if she’d wished him harm she likely would have caused it by now. So he fell back on his favorite icebreaker. “Would you like some tea?”

She narrowed her eyebrows incredulously. “…Sure, why not?” she sighed. She kicked the ground and reformed the earth into two distinctly seat-like formations before plopping down onto one. “Sorry about that. I thought you might be coming to mug me or something.”

“How did you even see me?” he wondered, gesturing to the large rock that had recently been separating the two of them from each other’s view as he sat on the other.

“I didn’t. I felt you moving with my earthbending.” She waved a hand in front of her eyes, which he now realized were startlingly pale. “I don’t see much of anything.”

“That’s pretty neat,” he mused. “Using earthbending to replace your sight. It’s smart.”

“Thanks,” she said dryly, evidently not particularly moved by his opinions.

“What kind of tea do you like? I’ve got jasmine, ginseng, lychee – “

“Whatever, man. I don’t really know anything about tea.”

Zuko shrugged and set a pot of ginseng tea brewing. “So you’re alone too, huh?”

She sighed more heavily. “I guess I am now.”

Zuko tilted his head to the side, remembering belatedly that she couldn’t see him. “What happened?”

“Geez, you’re nosy.”

“I am making you tea, you know,” he pointed out. His words held no heat. It was refreshing to interact with someone who spoke as bluntly and as brusquely as he was inclined to speak with everyone else.

“I didn’t ask for tea.”

“You accepted my offer.”

“Ugh, whatever. I got into a fight with my friends, alright? I ran away from home just to – to help them with their stupid mission and then they started acting like assholes so I left them too.” She crossed her arms, glaring mutinously.

“Did you try to work things out?” Zuko asked reasonably.

“What do you mean, work things out? There’s nothing to work out. I’m not traveling with them if they’re going to act that way.”

“How long have you been traveling with them?”

“I don’t know! A few days, maybe?”

“That’s it?” Zuko hadn’t meant to ask so condescendingly, but he couldn’t help it. That was a ridiculously short amount of time to spend with someone before deciding you were better off on your own. “Sorry, I didn’t – I just meant, you left your family behind to travel with them, right? Don’t you think you should try for at least a little longer before going off on your own?”

“I don’t owe them anything,” she snapped.

“I never said you did,” Zuko replied, taken aback. “I think you owe it to yourself.”

“You’re alone,” she pointed out.

“Not by choice.” He hesitated, then, not seeing the harm in it, kept going. “I’m a wanted criminal. Anyone I stay with would be in danger. You’re probably in danger right now.”

“I’ve been in danger plenty of times,” she dismissed. “I’ve spent four years fighting professional adult earthbenders every night for fun. I’m not scared of authorities. I wanna know what you did!”

Zuko blinked at her, bemusedly attempting to register what she’d told him. That was unbelievable. He considered blowing off the question, but once more he couldn’t see the harm in telling her, and it wasn’t like he had anything better to do. “My father is the Fire Lord. I was the heir to the throne until he disowned me and banished me from the Fire Nation when I was… thirteen. Spirits, I was thirteen. Who does that to a thirteen-year-old?” he burst out, shocked by the nearly overwhelming wave of anger that crashed into him. “You know he challenged me to an Agni Kai? My own father challenged me to a fight to the death – and when I wouldn’t fight him back, he burned half of my face off! And that’s not even the worst thing he’s ever done to me!”

“Buddy, your dad is super shitty,” the girl informed him. “I mean, even apart from being the evilest evil to ever evil.”

“That’s the most accurate way anyone’s ever described him to me,” Zuko remarked. He poured the tea into two cups and passed one to her. “So, anyway, I was thirteen, my dad kicked me out of the entire country, and I didn’t have any money but I did have a pair of swords so I bought a mask and became a bounty hunter. Ever heard of the Blue Spirit?”

“Nope!”

That… was surprising. He wasn’t sure how to react to that. “…Well, I was... a pretty famous bounty hunter. But this guy in the Fire Nation killed my mother and turned me into a wanted criminal, so I hunted him down to the North Pole where I found out he was planning to kill the Moon Spirit. I tried to stop him, but I failed. Come to think of it, I’m not sure what happened next. I wasn’t there for that. But my sister, the second ‘evilest evil to ever evil,’ is personally hunting me down now. And she can bend lightning. So anyone with me is in serious danger, greater than you can possibly imagine. She’ll kill anyone who gets in her way, easily and happily.”

“So what are you going to do?” the girl demanded. “I mean, you’re definitely in the most danger.”

Zuko shrugged. “I’m still working on that part. I’m not even sure how I’m going to pay for my next meal once my food runs out. I can hardly go catch criminals and drag them back to the authorities if I’m a criminal myself.”

“What if you go somewhere where the Fire Nation can’t get you?”

“What do you... What, like - like Ba Sing Se?” Zuko’s mind reeled. That hadn’t even occurred to him. Now he was almost resentful of himself for having invited her to have tea with him. If there was a place he could go to be safe, he owed it to that family to go there.

“Yeah!” She perked up. “You like tea, right? Go make tea in Ba Sing Se! That place is barely even in the war, I bet no one will even know you’re wanted.”

“That’s… That’s really smart,” he admitted reluctantly. “But my uncle, the Dragon of the West, nearly destroyed Ba Sing Se. How can I go seek refuge there now?”

“What the hell are you talking about? Who cares what your uncle did? You didn’t do anything to Ba Sing Se, right? You’re not responsible for what he did, or your father, or your sister. You’re your own person, buddy. Hey!” She grinned. “I could go with you!”

“Don’t be an idiot.” Zuko winced. That had definitely come out wrong. “What I mean is, you can’t go with me. I’m not in Ba Sing Se yet – there’s still plenty of time for me to get you killed. Besides that, you have friends that are probably really worried about you right now. You need to go back to them.”

The girl deflated. “…Yeah, I guess you’re right. They are a bunch of worrywarts. I should probably go let them know I’m okay.” There was a note of begrudging gratitude in her voice when she stood, adding, “Thanks for the tea, and the advice.”

“Thank you for the advice,” he returned, smiling back. “You… probably saved my life, come to think of it.”

“Nah, I don’t think so. I know a survivor when I see one, and you, whatever your name is – “

“Zuko.”

“You, Zuko, are a survivor.” She punched him in the shoulder. “Hey, write me a letter when you reach Ba Sing Se, okay?”

“I will.”

It was only after she left that he realized he never got her name.

For the first time in a long time, Zuko had a solid plan. First, he was going to visit an old ally who could probably hook him up with a fake passport. Next, he would have to pay a group of sandbenders to take him across the Si Wong Desert. Finally, he would take the ferry to Ba Sing Se, and then he supposed he would make tea like that girl had said. Whoever she was, he hoped she reunited with her friends, and to his surprise, he hoped he’d see her again. That was the most pleasant company he’d had since – well, probably since Aang. With a clear destination in mind, Zuko woke up early the next morning and started walking in the direction of his old ally.

Before he reached said destination, however, he saw a group of Fire Nation soldiers coming towards him via strangely slow procession of covered wagons. Cursing his luck, he quickly hid behind some rocks while they passed him.

“…finally caught them, and they’re probably going to escape again before we even get back to the Fire Nation, like they always do.”

“Oh, shut your yap already. It’s your carelessness that keeps letting them go. Now that I’m here, they’re not going anywhere.”

“Listen, I admit you’re better at this kind of thing than I am, but it was hard enough when it was just the three of them – and it was hard enough when we had ostrich horses for the carriages! I mean, how are we gonna transport two dozen Earth Kingdom rebels halfway across the Earth Kingdom without ostrich horses?”

“Relax, dumbass! Everything’s under control, alright? Nothing’s changed. We’ll pick up more ostrich horses in New Ozai.” New Ozai? What the hell is that? “Then it’ll be smooth sailing all the way back home. Now, go tell the first group of firebenders to get ready to start moving the carriages again. The nonbenders have been pushing for long enough.”

Zuko had heard of this before – on rare occasions, when something happened to a prisoner transport caravan and the ostrich horses got loose, the firebenders in the group would take shifts standing on the back of each carriage and using their bending to push the cart, similar to the way Azula used to climb trees by using a blast of fire to push her high enough to reach the next branch. Right now the nonbenders were pushing the carriages manually, but when the firebenders started moving the carriages again, their speed would triple.

”…two dozen Earth Kingdom rebels…”

Zuko made a split-second decision. He dropped his bag, threw himself over the rocks, rolled under the passing carriage between the wheels, and grabbed hold of its underside.

He closed his eyes tightly, hardly daring to breathe as he waited to be discovered. When no one seemed to notice, he relaxed, but only minutely. He wasn’t out of the woods yet. When the carriages sped up, he might be able to hold on, but it would be much harder, and it would be virtually impossible to find a way into whatever carriage he was on. He had no way of knowing whether there were soldiers, prisoners, or both in the carriage he was clinging to, but that wasn’t going to change before they reached their destination, and whatever New Ozai was, he wasn’t keen on sticking around to find out. He’d have to risk discovery and take the carriage by force.

His decision made, Zuko pulled one of his knees into his body and pressed his foot against the carriage. He swiftly cut a person-sized hole in the floor and kicked it into the carriage so the evidence wouldn’t fall and be seen by the other soldiers. His blood rushing in his ears for the first time in far too long, he stabbed the side of the floorboards inside the hole, wrapped his legs around the top of the sword where it wasn’t sharp, and used it as leverage to pull himself inside.

Soldier, prisoner, prisoner, prisoner, soldier, soldier, prisoner, prisoner, prisoner, soldier -

Having taken inventory of the situation, he drew his sword from the hole and stabbed one soldier in the shoulder with it. He shifted his grip on the hilt as the soldiers behind him reacted and used it as leverage once more to run up the first soldier’s body and push off of his face into a second soldier, narrowly dodging a fire blast that hit the first soldier instead and punching the second soldier in the throat. As the second soldier stumbled backwards, he grabbed him by the throat and shielded himself from two new blasts with his body. Then he threw him into the third soldier, drew his blade from the first soldier’s body, and slammed the hilt into the fourth soldier’s face hard enough to knock him out. Zuko took the fourth soldier by the arms and swung him hard enough to sweep him at the legs of the third soldier, who had recovered. With all four of them more or less handicapped, he shoved each of them out of the hole with ease. Then he got to work untying the prisoners.

One of them whistled low, grinning way too cheerfully. “Man, that was so cool, I don’t even know where to begin.”

“How about you begin with helping me take the rest of this caravan?” Zuko suggested sarcastically.

“Sounds good,” another prisoner agreed, glaring pointedly at the first.

Someone outside their carriage shrieked in alarm. “What happened to you guys?!”

“Hide along the walls,” the first prisoner said, growing serious. “We’ll take ‘em out one by one. They’ll probably come in from both sides, so watch yourselves.”

Zuko pressed himself to the wall with the prisoners. As the soldiers entered the carriage, with the help, he was able to make quick work of them. They went through the carriages releasing the rest of the prisoners, and then they tied up the soldiers and left them all on one of the carriages. A few prisoners volunteered to guard them while the rest went to get their things. The first prisoner pulled Zuko aside, the second and a third he’d yet to interact with hanging at his side. “I can’t even begin to tell you how glad I am that you were here today,” he told him. “Seriously. This douche has been chasing us for months, but once he teamed up with that scary-looking chick – she really knows what she’s doing. I thought we were done for this time.”

Zuko grunted.

“A word to the wise – you gotta watch your back from now on. Word’ll get back to the Fire Nation about this. I’m, like, public enemy number one out there, and these are enemies number two and three. The Fire Nation won’t forget about you freeing us.”

“Hmm. I doubt that.” Zuko handed him a list of wanted men and women with his name, face, and value at the top, which he’d taken from one of the guards so he could scan it for names he recognized from his bounty hunting days (luckily, he hadn't accidentally released anyone truly evil like a kidnapper or murderer). “You can’t be public enemy number one. I already am.”

The former prisoner looked the poster over, a smirk growing on his face. When he looked back up, it was taking over half of his face. “Well, it’s always nice to meet a fellow outlaw - especially one with a bounty like that on his head. Hello, Zuko. My name’s Jet.”

Chapter Text

I'm laying low
A stray dog in the street
You took me home

Sister Cities by The Wonder Years

Act 2: The Teamaker

Chapter 8: Stray Dog in the Street

”Well, it’s always nice to meet a fellow outlaw – especially one with a bounty like that on his head. Hello, Zuko. My name’s Jet.”

“Cool,” Zuko replied. He didn’t know why this guy was still talking.

Jet seemed completely oblivious to Zuko’s lack of interest in the conversation, which was frankly a generous word for it. “This is Smellerbee, and this is Longshot.”

“What did you do?” Smellerbee asked, looking impressed.

“Stole the Avatar from them a couple times,” he said simply. “I don’t have the mask anymore to prove it, but most know me as the Blue Spirit.”

Jet laughed in disbelief. “Seriously? You’re the Blue Spirit? You’re practically a legend!”

It wasn’t often that Zuko received a reaction like that, but it was true that he’d done almost exclusively good things as a bounty hunter, and it was surprisingly gratifying to have someone recognize that. Unfortunately, Jet was wrong. “I don’t think you can call me that,” he muttered, eyeing his blade tiredly. “No mask and only half of a sword. I’m hardly the Blue Spirit anymore.”

Jet scoffed. “Please! Of course you are. Look what you just did!”

“Alright, alright, Jet, tone it down,” Smellerbee complained. “Where you headed, Zuko?”

“Ba Sing Se. Now that I’m a wanted criminal, it’s hardly feasible for me to capture other criminals and deliver them to the authorities. May as well get myself to the last safe place left on earth.”

“No kidding,” Jet remarked. “We’re going there too.”

Oh no.

“Maybe we should travel together!”

Zuko searched for a polite way to tell him he was kind of annoying, but only came up with, “Thanks, but no thanks. I work alone.”

“Oh.” Jet sounded disappointed. “Well, thanks again for getting us out of here. I guess I’ll probably see you in Ba Sing Se!”

“Sure,” Zuko answered neutrally. He hesitated at the look on Jet’s face. Spirits, it’s like kicking a polar bear puppy. “It was nice to meet you, Jet, Smellerbee, Longshot,” he offered, and grimaced inwardly at how Jet’s face brightened.

“You too, man!”

“Thanks again for saving us,” Smellerbee said. Longshot nodded his assent.

Zuko hopped out of the carriage and walked away towards the place where he’d left his things. When he picked up the backpack, the three of them were standing around the carriage, discussing something in hushed, urgent voices. On a whim, he chose a path that would bring him past them again and said, “Hey, you three have passports, right?”

They looked up at him silently.

“For the ferry to Ba Sing Se.”

Jet shrugged. “We’ll figure it out.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Zuko echoed disbelievingly.

Jet shrugged again, grinning. “We always do. We’ve been in worse situations before.”

It occurred to Zuko that he had just risked his life to save these unprepared idiots. It was obviously an unnecessary sacrifice, because they were just going to get themselves captured again before they ever reached Ba Sing Se. He wondered if risking his life for no reason at all was a violation of his promise. My passport is only a few days away, he thought resentfully. …Just a few days. That’s it. “I know someone,” he said. “Over in Omashu. He can get us passports.”

“Seriously?” Jet’s jaw dropped.

Smellerbee’s did too. “’Us?’”

“Well, seeing as I just risked my life for you, I guess I’m somewhat invested in your survival now. So if you want to get passports, you’re welcome to join me on my way there.”

Jet was positively beaming at him now. “That would be so awesome, Zuko. Thanks.”

One of the other prisoners approached them. “Hey, you three, we finished counting the money we took from the guards,” she informed Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot. “Here are your shares.” She handed each of them a small pouch before turning to Zuko. “This is everything we couldn’t divide evenly, as thanks for saving us.”

“He just gets leftovers?” Smellerbee protested. “Shouldn’t he get an even share?”

“Relax, Smellerbee, it’s more than anyone else got,” she promised. “Some of ‘em had gold.”

Zuko looked inside the pouch she’d given him. True to her word, there was a handful of gold in there, along with a handful of copper and a couple silver. “Thank you,” he said in surprise. Dao flashed through his mind again; that gold would be more than enough to get from there to Omashu to Ba Sing Se with a stop for Dao in the middle, as out of the way as it was. In fact, if he invested in better transportation, it would cut his travel time by about two thirds. “Say, are any of you planning to use the carriages?”

“No. None of us can afford enough ostrich horses to pull one, so it’s a moot point. You could, though.” She inclined her head towards the pouch Zuko held.

Zuko turned to his three companions, pulling two gold pieces out of his pouch. “I’m willing to buy the ostrich horses to pull the carriage, but when we split up, I don’t want them. Either sell them afterwards or take care of them yourselves, but don’t mistreat them or abandon them. Deal?”

“Wait, you’re just gonna pay for the ostrich horses and give them to us?” Smellerbee stared at him like he’d grown a second head.

“I’m not taking care of them once I don’t need them anymore,” Zuko explained. “So you’ll have to put the work into selling them or the money into providing for them.”

“Deal,” Jet agreed easily. “Best deal I’ve ever heard.”

“Great. Would one of you mind buying them from the nearest village while the rest of us keep an eye on the soldiers? I’d offer, but I think I’m a little more wanted than you guys.”

“Ha! That’s true. I’ll go, you two stay here, okay?” Jet conferred with Smellerbee and Longshot.

“Alright,” Smellerbee agreed.

Longshot nodded.

Zuko handed the money to Jet. “If this isn’t enough, I’ll pay you back for whatever extra you have to spend when you get back.”

“Sure.” Jet held out his own open pouch to his friends, who poured their pouches into his like it was natural. The three of them must have been traveling together for a long time.

Jet started walking, and Zuko, Smellerbee, and Longshot returned to the carriage containing the guards-turned-prisoners as the former prisoners all went their separate ways. They made sure all of the guards were still unconscious before sitting down. “So, ‘Blue-ko,’ what happened to your mask?” Smellerbee asked.

“Did you hear about the siege at the North Pole?” he asked in response.

Smellerbee looked at him like he was stupid. “Everyone heard about that. The Moon Spirit died and came back to life. That kind of thing gets around.”

“The admiral who was leading the invasion, Zhao, he nearly killed me. He burnt my mask off of my face. I’m not really sure how I survived, to be honest.”

“Well, I’m not complaining!” Zuko forced a chuckle, which seemed to be the appropriate answer judging by the smile on Smellerbee’s face. “What were you doing there?”

“I chased him there,” Zuko admitted. “I was hunting him down for personal reasons when I found out he was planning to kill the Moon Spirit, so I hid on his ship and when the invasion began I ran to warn the Avatar and his friends about Zhao’s plan.”

“The stories are true,” Smellerbee remarked, amazed. “You really are a badass. Is that where you got the scar? Was it Zhao?”

“No.” Zuko felt his brief contentment draining from him. He left it at that, and Smellerbee fell silent, obviously picking up on his mood change.

It didn’t take long before Jet returned atop an ostrich horse with three others in tow. To Zuko’s surprise, Jet immediately handed him one of the gold pieces Zuko had sent him with. “What’s this? There’s no way it was that cheap.”

Jet snorted. “I’m not going to start this partnership by having you pay for our ride. We can and will carry our own weight.”

“But you’re the one getting saddled with them when we split,” Zuko pointed out.

Smellerbee snickered. Zuko responded with a funny look, which was returned. “…That pun was on purpose, right?”

“…’Pun’…? Oh. ‘Saddled.’ No, that wasn’t on purpose.”

“Blueko, we need to work on your sense of humor.”

“Anyway,” Jet interjected, “I don’t consider you essentially buying two ostrich horses for us to be us ‘getting saddled with them.’ True, we probably only would have bought one, but feeding an extra ostrich horse is definitely worth the time saved getting from place to place. So take the money and shut up, alright?”

Zuko did shut up, but only out of surprise at being spoken to that way. He considered taking offense, but that seemed like it might be an inappropriate reaction to being given money, so he decided not to. “…Thanks.”

“Hey, you don’t need to thank me for being a decent person!” Jet clapped him on the shoulder. “We might be outlaws, but I’ve always believed in honor among thieves.” Zuko hummed. “Now, let’s head to Omashu.”

Naturally, since Zuko and his prevalent bad luck were traveling with Jet and his ‘Freedom Fighters,’ as he’d informed Zuko they were called, they couldn’t even get through a one-day trip without incident. Along the mountains they meant to cross to reach Omashu, a Fire Nation blockade was set up. “Of course,” Jet sighed. “Now what?”

Zuko stared intensely at the blockade. “If we were on foot, maybe we could sneak past them. We’d have to leave the carriage here – and someone would have to stay with the carriage, too. And it couldn’t be me, because I’m the one with the connection. If someone’s willing to do that, I’ve got a plan. If not, well, I’ll think of something else.”

Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot exchanged glances, which seemed to be their primary form of communication. Then the three of them turned to Zuko. “Longshot will stay,” Smellerbee told him.

Zuko didn’t bother questioning it. “Okay. So let’s go get ourselves some uniforms. That’s the easiest thing to do. The three of us will lie in wait at the outskirts of the blockade, wait for three soldiers to come by, and take their uniforms. Then we drag the soldiers far enough from the blockade that no one will find them. If someone finds them before we get back, we’re doomed. We get to the other side of the blockade as fast as we can without drawing attention to ourselves – just follow my lead, alright? I’ve got more than enough experience infiltrating the Fire Nation.” And living there. “We have to store the uniforms somewhere safe while we’re in Omashu. We’ll need them in order to pass through the blockade again.”

“Okay, sounds like a solid plan,” Jet agreed.

“Yes, I know, because it was mine,” Zuko grumbled.

Jet turned to Longshot. “If we’re not back in… two days? That sound about right, Zuko?”

“Sure.”

“If we’re not back in two days, put the carriage somewhere safe. Do what Zuko said we’d do; get a soldier, stick them somewhere far away, take their uniform. Try to find out whether we’re being held there or not, and if not, go back to the carriage and wait for us for a third day. Then, sneak into Omashu and ask around for our fake names.”

“What are your fake names?” Zuko interjected.

“Mishing and Shoni.”

“Okay. Mine is Xin,” Zuko added to Longshot. He turned to Jet and Smellerbee. “That’ll do once we’re in the Earth Kingdom, but as soldiers, I’ll be Tazo, Jet, you’ll be Jara, and Smellerbee – “ Zuko hesitated. He had yet to attribute a gender to Smellerbee, which hadn’t been a problem until now. “…Listen – “

“I’m a girl,” Smellerbee grumbled, clearly used to his unspoken question.

“Great. Okay, you’ll be Izazi. Those are three pretty basic Fire Nation names.”

“Good thinking. I guess that’s another pro of your experience infiltrating those bastards, huh?” Jet mused. “How much will the fake passports cost, by the way?”

“Twelve silver for one.”

Jet opened his money pouch and started counting out silver pieces into a second pouch, likely one of the two empty pouches from the money they’d gotten from the guards. Once he reached thirty-six, he handed the other pouch to Longshot. Then he turned to Smellerbee. “Ready to go?”

“Yep.”

“Zuko?”

Zuko hummed in affirmation. The three of them set off towards the blockade in silence, which had been exceedingly rare ever since Zuko had begun traveling with the Freedom Fighters. Jet generally talked incessantly. Smellerbee, at least, seemed to share Zuko’s dislike for that habit. Longshot didn’t speak at all, but he did nod, shake his head, and react through facial expressions, which was good enough for Jet. When they finally reached the outskirts, Zuko whispered to Smellerbee, “I didn’t ask before, but would you mind wearing a male guard’s uniform, if it came down to it?”

“That’s fine.” The three of them waited until a small group of five soldiers showed up, one of whom wore a general’s armor. “Take them or keep waiting?” Smellerbee hissed.

Zuko grimaced, exchanging glances with Jet. “…Take them.”

The three of them leapt out from their hiding places. Zuko went right for the general and got him in a chokehold, positioning the tip of his sword at the general’s neck. “No one moves unless I tell you to or I move too,” he declared calmly. “Drop your weapons. Strip. Hold your hands behind your backs.”

The four soldiers looked to the general in alarm. “D-Do what he says,” the general stuttered, so the soldiers complied. Once their uniforms were all off, Jet and Smellerbee tied them all up, and then Zuko tied up the general too.

“Wait a second,” Jet objected. “Shouldn’t someone take that one’s uniform? He looks kind of important, like maybe he has power.”

“He’s a general, and unless you think you can pull off pretending to be a general, who knows all about this blockade and why it’s here and what each soldier is supposed to be doing, I recommend we leave his clothes on,” Zuko retorted.

Jet winced. “…Yeah, that’s fair.”

Zuko, Jet, and Smellerbee took the uniforms and armor of the soldiers closest to them in build. Then Zuko snatched the money pouches from the five of them and poured all the money into a pile on the ground. “I’m splitting it in four, not three,” he told them. He doubted either of them would object, considering earlier they’d consolidated all of their money anyway, but it would be better to make sure they knew just in case.

“Oh, okay,” Jet replied, surprised.

Zuko finished up and put his share into his money pouch. As expected, Jet took all three of the remaining shares and put them into his own pouch, and Smellerbee gave no indication that this was abnormal. They dragged the real soldiers off a few yards, steeled themselves, and headed into the blockade. No sooner had they gotten there than another general approached them. “What are you doing here?”

“Heading to Omashu, ma’am,” Zuko answered promptly, saluting her. Jet and Smellerbee promptly followed suit. “We were instructed to go pick up supplies.”

“Hmm.” The general eyed him suspiciously. “We’re not supposed to be calling it Omashu anymore, you know.”

“Of course, ma’am. My apologies.” Zuko’s mind reeled. What the hell did that mean? Was this blockade part of an attempt to take over Omashu?

The general nodded. “Carry on.”

Zuko waited until the general passed before lowering his arm and leading Jet and Smellerbee away. “Why aren’t they calling it Omashu?” Jet hissed.

“I don’t know, but I have a feeling we’ll find out soon,” Zuko hissed back.

Miraculously, they reached the other side without being approached again, but their problems were far from over. “…Who here has actually been to Omashu?” Jet inquired casually.

“I have,” Zuko grunted, looking despairingly at the city that had once been a great Earth Kingdom stronghold and had now been taken over by the Fire Nation.

“Is it…?”

“If you ask me if it’s supposed to look like that, I’m going to stab you.”

“…So that’s a ‘no,’ then?”

Smellerbee punched Jet in the arm, hard.

“Ow!”

“Now what?” Smellerbee asked Zuko.

“How the fuck should I know?” Zuko massaged his temples. He didn’t know how his life had gotten so complicated. Agni, he should never have gone after the Avatar to begin with. He should have just kept to himself and continued working as a bounty hunter. Everything was so much easier when he was a simple bounty hunter hunting simple bounties.

“Alright, everyone who was living in Omashu has to have gone somewhere, right?” Jet reasoned. “Either they’re still in Omashu living in terror, or they’ve gone underground, or they’ve left. So we go in with these uniforms and we find out where they went, and when we find them, we find out where your friend went.”

“…Yeah, alright,” Zuko grumbled, adding begrudgingly, “That’s a good plan.”

Jet smirked at him. “Yes, I know, because it was mine.”

Zuko supposed he deserved that.

As night fell, the three of them made their way down to Omashu, or whatever it was called now. “Whatever we do, we don’t split up,” Jet muttered urgently as they approached the guards.

Zuko nodded to the guards. “Good evening. We’re here to pick up supplies for the blockade.”

“Oh, perfect!” one of them exclaimed. “The order was just finished. Hang on, I’ll go get it.”

What.

“Thanks,” Zuko said weakly as the guard darted off, leaving the three of them alone with the other guard, who would surely have backup nearby that would attack them if they attacked him. He resolutely did not look at Jet and Smellerbee, although he did wonder if they were exchanging glances behind them, communicating nonverbally even with their faces covered by helmets. “…So… man, how long has it been since this place got renamed, anyway?” he laughed, like it was a joke. “Feels like forever.”

“I know, right? Hard to believe it’s been New Ozai for almost a month,” the guard laughed back. “Man, I’m telling you, the end of the war is coming. I can feel it. It’s only a matter of time before Ba Sing Se falls too at this point.”

“You’re not worried about the Avatar’s return?” Jet asked in surprise.

“Nah. The Avatar was here, don’t you know that? That’s when Princess Azula renamed it in Fire Lord Ozai’s honor. I was here when they fought. She is absolutely terrifying in a battle,” the guard finished dreamily. “And, I mean, for a kid, he wasn’t bad. But he didn’t stand a chance. That was obvious from the beginning.”

“I’ve seen her fight before,” Zuko remarked, his gut twisting as he wondered what had become of Aang and his friends after that fight. “She’s probably the best firebender in the world after her father.”

“Yeah, no kidding. She was so furious when she found out that the governor let all those resistance members escape with the Avatar and his cronies. I thought she was gonna kill him. It was bad enough when he tried to trade the old king for that kid the Avatar kidnapped.”

The first guard returned with a small bag of stuff. “Thanks,” Zuko repeated as he took in everything the guard had told him. He looked inside the bag to stall for time, and that was when inspiration struck. He scowled as he looked back up. “Where’s the feed?”

The first guard stared back in confusion. “Uh, the feed? What feed?”

“The feed,” Zuko repeated, allowing his pent-up frustration to seep into his voice. “For the ostrich horses. The ones pulling the caravan full of prisoners headed right for the blockade. The ones that are going to need feeding when they get there.”

The guards exchanged nervous glances. The first guard said hesitantly, “…There was no feed in the order….”

“Yeah, you try telling our superiors that,” Zuko retorted. “Just forget about it. We’ll go get it ourselves.” He shook his head. “You want something done right, you gotta do it yourself. Come on, guys.” He waved his hand, and the three of them strode right past the two dumbfounded guards. When they were far enough away, Zuko whispered, “Now what? I got us in.”

“I’ll figure something out,” Jet whispered back.

Zuko felt like pulling his hair out of his head. That wasn’t what he wanted to hear. “Well, in the meantime, let’s find some feed. And a wagon, I guess.” They headed for a marketplace, where Zuko approached a feed merchant. “Excuse me, sir, could you tell me where I could get a wagon? I’m gonna need a lot of feed.”

“I’ve got one you can borrow,” the merchant offered. “Free of charge for our nation’s dedicated soldiers.”

“Thank you, sir. Your support is greatly appreciated.” Zuko pulled out his money pouch. “How much for twenty bags?”

“Fifteen copper.”

Zuko slid the money forward, and as the merchant started putting bags of feed into the wagon, Jet yanked him backwards and hissed in his ear, “Why didn’t you just tell him it was for the soldiers and try to get that for free?”

“I don’t want to draw unnecessary attention,” Zuko muttered.

“But you just spent fifteen copper,” Smellerbee protested. “And you gave it to Fire Nation scum!”

“He’s not getting his wagon back,” Zuko pointed out tiredly. “I’m not getting caught over fifteen copper. Besides, it’s not like we aren’t going to use the feed, and we got it for a good price because he thinks we’re Fire Nation scum.” He’s one third right, too. “Just let it go.”

Jet grinned suddenly. “Oh, I’ve got an idea.”

“Go on.”

“Fair warning; it’s a terrible idea and you’re not gonna like it.”

“Thrilling. Go on.”

“Your friend is probably with the resistance, right?”

Zuko thought for a moment. “Yeah, probably.”

“Well… I'd wager King Bumi knows where the resistance is.”

“No.”

“I’m just saying, it’s an idea.”

“Like you said, it’s a terrible idea, and like you said, I don’t like it.”

“Well, then, you come up with something.”

Zuko groaned. “Dammit, Jet. Fine. Let’s go hunt this guy down.” He turned to the merchant, who was just finishing up. “Would you mind keeping this here for a bit? There’s something we need to investigate before we leave.”

“Of course, soldier.”

“Thank you.”

“How can you be so friendly with him?” Jet complained as they walked away. “That Fire Nation man.”

“Relax, Jet,” Smellerbee interjected. “He’s just a merchant. It’s not like he’s the Fire Lord himself.”

“He supports the Fire Lord, obviously.”

“So what is it that you’re offended by? Him supporting the Fire Lord, or him being Fire Nation?” Zuko asked curiously.

Jet threw his hands in the air. “Is there a difference?”

“Of course there is.” Zuko was careful to keep his voice even and casual. “I’ve been all over the world, and there are people everywhere who don’t support their rulers. People in the Northern Water Tribe who don’t support their chief, people in Omashu who didn’t support the king. I’m sure there are people here now who don’t support the governor – hell, that guard back there sure didn’t seem to.”

“Seemed like he liked the princess well enough,” Jet snorted.

“There are two kinds of people who have met Princess Azula; those who worship the ground she walks on, and those who have nightmares about her. Once you’ve seen her in action….” Zuko shivered involuntarily. “It’s not about her being the princess. It’s about her being Azula. Anyway,” he looked around at the abandoned alley they’d stumbled across, “here is as good a place as any to figure out how we’re going to get to the king.”

“Why don’t we just kidnap another Fire Nation soldier?” Smellerbee suggested. “And then, you know, make them tell us?”

“Some random soldier isn’t going to know.” Zuko disagreed. “But….” He glanced up towards the palace. “I know who would.”

“You’re even crazier than I am,” Jet declared admiringly.

Smellerbee put her head in her hands. “I'm the only sane person here. Fine. How do we get up there?”

“Some guards are going to bring us right to their doorstep.” Zuko walked out of the alley and waved down the nearest pair of guards. “Good evening, soldiers. My friends and I were sent by the Fire Nation to investigate the escape of the Earth Kingdom rebels.”

“Again?” one of them groaned. “Someone was here just last week, and two weeks before that too.”

“The Fire Lord likes to be thorough. Success like his doesn’t come from carelessness. We should all aim to be so thorough.”

“Yeah, yeah. I guess you need to talk to the governor, huh?” Zuko nodded. “Alright, I’ll find some palace guards to bring you up there. Give me a second.” The guard ran off.

His partner looked at Zuko dubiously. “Tell me you’re not one of those brown-nosing Royal Family worshippers.”

“Are you implying I shouldn’t worship our esteemed Fire Lord and Crown Princess? They are the most powerful firebenders and most brilliant strategists in the world. I can only hope to do their image justice as I act out their wishes, regardless of my lowly rank.”

The guard stared at him in silent disbelief until the first guard returned with a palace guard. “You’re here to talk to the governor’s family, right? I’ll bring you there.” She led them through Omashu to the palace. “Excuse me, Governor Ukano? Governess Michi?” Zuko’s blood ran cold. “Some soldiers are here to ask you about the resistance escape.”

Zuko subtly shifted behind Jet and Smellerbee and whispered frantically in their ears, “I cannot speak to them. They might recognize my voice.”

Before either of them could question him, the doors opened. Ukano looked much more weary than he had in Zuko’s childhood. “Come on in, gentlemen,” he sighed, putting up an obviously fake smile. He stood back and allowed the three of them to enter. “The Fire Lord has more questions for me?”

“Yes, sir,” Smellerbee said. “If we could speak somewhere private…?”

Ukano glanced around at his wife, toddler son - That’s new, Zuko thought absently - and guards. “Yes, of course.”

The three of them stepped into a separate room. There was no time to waste. Zuko stepped behind him, removed his belt and unsheathed his sword, and wrapped the belt around his mouth while carefully angling the sword downwards toward a place where he probably wouldn’t like to be stabbed – with both hands on the belt, it would be difficult to pin it to his neck as he normally would. "No need to panic, Governor," Jet informed him mockingly. "We just have a few questions for you. If you're straight-forward, and honest, then no one has to get hurt.... Someone brought more rope, right?”

Zuko nodded and gestured to his messenger bag with his chin.

Smellerbee walked over to him and took the rope out. She tied Ukano’s hands behind his back. Zuko tied the belt, pointed the sword directly at Ukano’s neck, and nodded to Jet. “Okay, pal. Tell us where King Bumi is, and everyone gets out of this unharmed.”

Smellerbee lowered the belt so Ukano could speak. “…I can’t…. The Fire Lord will kill me,” he whispered harshly, tears falling from his eyes. “Please. I have a wife and two kids. Please. Just stop this now and I won’t tell anyone.”

“The Fire Lord never needs to know about this,” Jet promised. “We don’t plan to release the king. We just want to talk to him about the resistance.”

“The resistance? What do you want to know?”

“Just want to know where they are,” Jet answered, tilting his head to the side. “What’s the name of your friend…, Tazo?”

Zuko waved Smellerbee over. When she was close enough, he leaned forward and whispered, “Chit Sang.”

“Chit Sang,” Smellerbee announced.

“Chit Sang? The fake passport guy? He – He was captured when we took this city. He’s probably..." Ukano wilted and finished miserably, "...on his way to a Fire Nation prison right now.”

“That’s not very specific. I don’t suppose you have any more information for us?” Jet challenged. He looked pointedly at Zuko’s sword, which Zuko pushed a little deeper, drawing a thin line of blood from Ukano’s throat.

“Th-Th-There was a general named Bujing involved,” Ukano whimpered. “That’s all I know, please, I swear!”

Jet hesitated. “Fine. We’ll make do. I’m going to have my friends release you now, and you’re not going to tell anyone about this, got it? Or else word gets back to the Fire Lord about you helping us out just now.”

Zuko leaned over to Smellerbee again. “His daughter Mai is best friends with Azula.”

Taking the hint, Smellerbee put in, “And then word gets back to his daughter, and her best friend, your daughter Mai.”

Ukano paled. “H-H-How do you know - ?”

“We know lots of things,” Smellerbee dismissed. “Come on, guys, let’s get out of here.”

Smellerbee untied Ukano and put the rope back in Zuko’s messenger bag. Zuko took his belt back and sheathed his sword. The three of them strode out of the room. “Thank you for your time, Governor,” Jet told him smugly. They left the palace and headed out of Omashu, retrieving the wagon of feed on the way. As they traveled from Omashu back to the blockade, Jet said, “Any ideas now, Smellerbee? Zuko?”

“Zilch,” Smellerbee answered.

“Oh, I’ve got plenty of ideas,” Zuko hissed, reaching up to touch his scar under his mask. “Ideas for what we can do with Bujing once we take him down.”

Jet stopped and looked at him in shock. “Is he the guy who…?”

”What better to use as bait than fresh meat?”

“He may as well have been.”

“So we hunt down this Bujing guy, we get Chit Sang, we get our passports,” Smellerbee summarized. “Okay. You think that general we tied up earlier will know where Bujing and Chit Sang are headed?”

Zuko grinned sharply. “He just might.”

Longshot stared at them in wordless amazement as they rolled a wagon filled with feed up to him.

“Yes, I know, we’re amazing,” Smellerbee boasted.

“We still don’t have the passports,” Zuko reminded her.

“Details, details. We will soon enough.” She cracked her knuckles. “We know exactly where he is, at least. Longshot, you’re not gonna believe what happened! Omashu doesn’t even exist anymore! It’s called New Ozai now.” She wrinkled her nose.

Longshot looked her up and down and raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, yeah, we decided to keep the uniforms. We’ll look a lot less suspicious riding around in a Fire Nation carriage if we look like Fire Nation soldiers. We got one for you, too.” She reached into Zuko’s messenger bag – without permission, he might add, presumably having decided his permission earlier was permanent – and retrieved the uniform of the fourth soldier.

Zuko took a bag of feed from the wagon, opened it up, and fed the four ostrich horses. Jet followed him over and leaned against the carriage. “So, this Bujing guy. What’d he do?”

“…I can’t tell you that.” Zuko had an odd feeling of déjà vu as he recalled saying the same exact thing to Aang’s friends the last time he’d seen them. He wondered what it would be like to be able to tell people things. He wasn’t sure he could remember a time when he didn’t have secrets – actually, thinking back to the way he and Azula had lived under their father’s thumb, maybe that time had never existed at all. “I’d rather not talk about it.”

Jet shrugged. “Okay. That’s fair.”

“Thank you for your permission,” Zuko replied sarcastically.

“I was just trying to make conversation!” Jet defended himself.

“Who asks about a scar on a guy’s face as small talk? That’s not a conversation starter!”

“Oh, and you’re the expert on small talk? Fine then, you come up with something.”

“Why do we have to talk at all?” He meant it as a genuine question, but Jet huffed and walked off as if offended. Zuko sighed and packed up the feed. He went into the carriage, put his backpack on, and got off again. Jet raised an eyebrow at him as he approached. “Would you like some tea?”

Jet stared at him. “…I don’t understand you at all.”

“Is that a ‘no?’” Zuko wasn’t quite sure what he’d do with that. That would certainly be an unprecedented situation.

Jet stared at him for a bit longer, then burst into laughter. “Sure, I’d love some tea,” he cackled. “Thanks.”

Zuko didn’t understand him either, but he was used to that. He set up a campfire, scooped some water out of a nearby stream with his teapot, and put some tea leaves in the water. “Would you two like tea as well?” he asked Smellerbee and Longshot. They both nodded, so he put some more water and tea leaves in, and then he set it on the logs to boil.

“So anyway, Longshot,” Smellerbee continued her story as she sat down beside him at the campfire with Longshot across from him, “we found out from that general that they’re bringing Blueko’s friend Chit Sang right to the Fire Nation, and then to the Boiling Rock, some sort of high-security prison in the Fire Nation. We gotta intercept them on their way to the nearest dock.”

“And with our handy new outfits, we might not even have to fight our way in or out,” Jet mused as he sat on Zuko’s other side. “I mean, you’re pretty smooth in a tight spot, Zuko. I bet you can talk our way right in and right out with Chit Sang in tow.”

“That’s crazy,” Zuko objected, but already a plan was forming in his mind. “…Although….”

Jet grinned at him. “Knew I could count on you.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“So how’d you know that governor, anyway?” Smellerbee asked.

“I told you his daughter Mai was one of Azula’s best friends, right? Well, I ran into all three of ‘em at the same time.”

“What’s so terrifying about this ‘Azula?’” Jet put in.

“Her fire is so hot it’s blue, and she can bend lightning.”

“What? I’ve never heard of anything like that before.” Jet ran a hand through his hair. “That’s crazy. I’ve never even heard of the Fire Lord bending lightning.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Zuko grunted as he poured the tea into four cups. “But I know she can.”

Longshot took a sip and held the tea towards him, nodding firmly.

Zuko looked askance at Smellerbee, who translated, “He’s complimenting the tea. It is pretty good.”

“Thanks,” Zuko replied, gratified. “It’s the only thing I’m good at, other than catching criminals and breaking into the Fire Nation. It’s what I plan to do in Ba Sing Se.”

“The great Blue Spirit, a teamaker? I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t met you,” she teased. “You’re not nearly as mysterious as people think you are, though. Just awkward.”

Zuko shrugged. “I hope you’re not expecting me to deny that.” She and Jet laughed, and Longshot’s expression conveyed quiet amusement. “You three have clearly heard plenty about me. Tell me more about you. How did you three meet and become the Freedom Fighters?”

“Jet and I formed the Freedom Fighters together with a couple others before Longshot ever met us,” Smellerbee explained. “I ran away from home after the Fire Nation took over my parents’ village. I’m probably one of the only Freedom Fighters whose parents might still be alive out there somewhere, but I wasn’t content to lie down and take the Fire Nation’s abuse like they were. I ran into Jet and his friends pretty fast after that, and we picked Longshot up a year later.”

“My parents are dead,” Jet admitted, casting his gaze into the depths of his tea. “My village was burned down, and I was the ‘lucky’ survivor. What about you? You an orphan too?”

“Unfortunately not,” Zuko muttered darkly. “My mother died a couple years ago, though. So I guess I’m half-orphan and half-disowned.”

“Geez, that’s rough,” Smellerbee remarked. “I’m sure my parents would take me back in a heartbeat if I wanted them to, but Jet and Longshot are my family now.”

“What happened to the rest of the Freedom Fighters?” Zuko asked.

“Fire Nation happened. The rest of them got away safely. The three of us were the distraction – that’s why we’re the ones the Fire Nation is chasing,” Jet explained.

“So that’s why you’re heading to Ba Sing Se now. You’ve distracted the Fire Nation well enough, and now you're heading to safety.”

“That’s right. It’ll be nice to be safe again,” Smellerbee commented.

Zuko wondered what it was like to be safe.

They retired to the carriage for the night, taking shifts watching over the ostrich horses. Zuko expected to have trouble sleeping, but found the motion of the carriage oddly soothing, and slept well that night. When Jet woke him for his shift, he felt well-rested. It was on his shift that he spotted the Fire Nation caravan they were looking for up ahead. He headed into the carriage and woke the others. “Come on. Time to get Chit Sang.”

Zuko hid inside the carriage with Longshot while Jet and Smellerbee sat in front. “Good evening,” Jet greeted the guards of the caravan as they pulled up alongside the front carriage. “We’ve got orders from General Mezon of the New Ozai blockade to pull one of your prisoners, Chit Sang.”

“Chit Sang? He’s the one we’re sending to Boiling Rock. You must have the wrong name.”

“No, I’m positive. You can double check with him if you like, but I doubt you’ll receive an answer before you hit the dock, and you can hardly send a prisoner on a boat when he’s wanted elsewhere.”

The guard sighed. “Alright, fine, but what are your names? It’s falling on your heads if you’re wrong.”

“I’m Jara, this is Izazi, and that’s just fine, because I’m right.”

“I’ll be right back.”

Zuko restrained a snort as his 'fellow soldier' retreated. That's the problem with the Fire Nation; they think all of their people are so powerful, and everyone else is so incompetent. It never occurs to them that someone could take out one of their soldiers and successfully impersonate them. He held his breath, exchanging hopeful glances with Longshot. Before they knew it, someone new was being pushed into their carriage. His jaw dropped, as did Zuko’s. Despite his disparaging internal commentary, he couldn’t believe it was actually that easy. Nothing was ever that easy.

The carriage started moving faster, presumably as they left the caravan, and Smellerbee popped inside. “Well? This the guy you were looking for, Blueko?”

“Yep, that’s him.” Zuko grinned. “Good to see you again, Chit Sang. You up for making a few fake passports?”

“Ha! For you, after this? Anything, buddy!” Chit Sang grinned back. “…Mind undoing my chains though?”

“Oh, I’ve got the keys. I’ll do it.” Smellerbee went to unlock his chains.

Zuko headed to the front of the carriage. “Now what?” Jet asked. “You still gonna split as soon as we get our passports? I mean, I’ve been thinking about it, and it just doesn’t make sense. We’re all going to the same place anyway, and there’s safety in numbers.”

“I would travel there with you,” Zuko told him honestly. “You’re right, that makes more sense. But…” He looked away.

“But?” Jet pressed.

Zuko sighed. They already thought he was soft. He supposed it didn’t matter if he confirmed it. “…It’s my ostrich horse. When I went off to the North Pole, I left him with someone way, way up north. I washed up afterwards just a couple days’ travel from where I met you guys. I need to go get him back before I can go to Omashu.”

Jet shook his head. “Man, you just keep surprising me. All that for an ostrich horse?”

“Yes,” Zuko said tersely.

“Hey, no judgment!” Jet held his hands in the air. “I guess I understand him being so important to you if you’ve been alone all this time…, but…, well, how far is that from here, anyway?”

Zuko shrugged. “I guess a few weeks.”

“Listen, Zuko, you’ve really saved our asses here. I mean, you rescued us from the Fire Nation, you bought us these ostrich horses, and now you’ve gotten us fake passports to Ba Sing Se. I don’t know where we’d be without you. So I can’t really speak for Longshot and Smellerbee, but I think they’d agree with me that it’d be pretty rotten of us to let you walk all that way by foot after all that. If you’d rather stick with us - I mean, I’ll have to talk to them first, but I think we’d be perfectly willing to give you a ride there.”

“I’ll… I’ll think about it,” Zuko conceded slowly, surprised. “I appreciate the offer, whether I take it or – stop the carriage!”

“What - ?”

Before he could answer, Zuko yanked on the reins, jerking the carriage to a stop, and leapt out of the carriage. He couldn’t believe his eyes.

“What is it?” Jet called after him, leaving the carriage too.

“What’s going on?” Smellerbee asked as she, Longshot, and Chit Sang poked their heads out of the carriage.

Zuko reached out to the bush in front of him with a shaking hand. Hardly breathing, he gingerly lifted a clump of white fur. Ahead of him, a whole trail of white fur led right to a cave, where a pair of eyes, so large he could see them even across the large distance, watched him. “I think I just found another old friend.”

Chapter Text

It's uphill for oddities
The stranger crusaders
Ain't ever wannabes

High Hopes by Panic! At the Disco

Act 2: The Teamaker

Chapter 9: Stranger Crusaders

Hardly breathing, he gingerly lifted a clump of white fur. Ahead of him, a whole trail of white fur led right to a cave, where a pair of eyes, so large he could see them even across the large distance, watched him. “I think I just found another old friend.”

“Your friend has long white fur?” Smellerbee demanded. “What kind of company do you keep?”

Zuko ignored her, walking cautiously towards the creature in the cave. “It’s okay,” he called out hopefully. “I know you. I’m a friend. Do you recognize me?” Belatedly, he wondered if Appa would recognize him as a friend; he had tried to kidnap Aang a few times before he started saving him instead, but he was pretty sure Appa was only there for the saving-him bits. “Appa? Do you remember me?” He covered his face as he approached. “Do you remember my voice?” Appa answered with a low rumble that sounded neither hostile nor friendly. Zuko kept going, undeterred, and soon he was face to face with the animal. “Appa, can I touch you?” Zuko stretched a hand out first. Appa sniffed it, hesitated for a heart-stopping moment, then licked it. “Good, Appa. You do remember me.” Zuko slowly stroked the bison’s head. Appa was covered in thorns, honey, and boar-q-pine quills, and his six feet were chained together. Agni, he had so many questions.

“That’s the Avatar’s pet?” Jet hissed. He was just a few feet behind Zuko, which was, perhaps, why Appa was so reticent. Jet had mentioned his rather unpleasant history with the Avatar, so it was no wonder Appa might not want him so close.

“Yes. Back up.” Jet backed away slowly. Zuko continued petting Appa’s head. “Appa, we’re gonna find Aang for you, okay?” Appa’s entire countenance lightened at Aang’s name. Zuko laughed, light-headed from the adrenaline rush of discovering Aang’s bison. “Yeah, we’re gonna find Aang, and Suki, and Katara, and Sokka, and Momo too. We’re gonna find all of them for you. Okay?” Appa licked his face, which was not something he’d ever wanted to go through, but he supposed it was a necessary sacrifice. “First we have to get all these quills and thorns off of you, though. And we gotta pick the lock on those chains. No more chains, Appa. Doesn’t that sound nice?” Appa roared happily in agreement. “You want to meet my friends, Appa?”

“Aw, Jet, he called us friends,” Smellerbee snickered from the carriage.

“Chit Sang, he doesn’t know you yet. You come over first.” Zuko heard Chit Sang’s uncharacteristically quiet footsteps as he crept towards them. After a few seconds, with Zuko’s hands still stroking him, Appa grumbled begrudgingly and nosed Chit Sang’s hand, which was good enough for Zuko. Zuko sent him back to the carriage and called over Longshot, then Smellerbee, then Jet. It took a while, especially for Jet, but Appa settled down around them well enough that Zuko thought it’d be okay for them to touch him. “Okay, first thing’s first; we need to pick that lock on his chains, and then we need to get the thorns and quills out, and then we need to wash off the honey,” Zuko decided, keeping his voice soft for Appa’s sake.

“What about food?” Smellerbee pointed out, following his example. “I think Appa should eat before anything else.” Appa perked up and roared his approval.

“You’re right. Jet, could you go get some food for him? I don’t know if he eats meat, but I know he eats fruit. Giving him food will probably endear you to him a bit more. Bring my bag with you, too.” Jet backed up slowly and went to get some fruit. When he returned with it, Appa glanced at them all warily before scarfing it all down like he hadn’t eaten in days. With a pang in his chest, Zuko wondered if he really hadn’t. He didn’t understand how something like this could have happened. Appa was a powerful airbender in his own right, and even if separated from Aang, he should have been able to defend himself from pretty much anything. Zuko took his bag from Jet, pulled his lockpick out, and went to work on Appa’s chains. The bison watched him suspiciously but didn’t pull away, and he yelped joyfully when the chains fell off, licking Zuko’s entire body in one fell swoop. “Come on, now, Appa. Let’s leave the cave just a little so we can get all of these nasty things out?” He met eyes with Jet. “You three should probably get out of here. I doubt he likes you that much.”

“Alright, let’s skedaddle,” Jet agreed, and the three of them headed back to the carriage.

Zuko led Appa a few feet further so that he could get to Appa’s sides, at least. Taking a deep breath, he took the nearest quill and gently teased it out of Appa’s skin. Appa moaned unhappily, but rumbled contently when it was all the way out. Zuko painstakingly worked over the rest of his body with the same gentleness, and Appa looked at him like he was Agni’s gift to the world when they were all out. Zuko had a funny feeling he’d made a lifelong friend for himself. Much more trusting now, Appa allowed himself to be led all the way back to the stream they’d parked the carriage beside, although Zuko carefully steered clear of the carriage itself and the ostrich horses at its helm. Zuko reached forward to scoop some water up –

- the ocean pushed him gently onto a piece of driftwood –

“ – I just want to focus on getting to Ba Sing Se – “

“ – more clumps, I’m sure the Avatar is this way – “

“ZUKO!”

Zuko leapt up and stumbled backwards so fast he tripped and fell on his back. “Azula,” he gasped out.

“What about Azula? What’s going on?” Smellerbee questioned, her hands hovering above his shoulders like she wasn’t sure whether to touch him or not.

Zuko scrambled to his feet and raced for Appa. “Appa, I need you to stay calm for me, okay? We gotta go somewhere and I need you to let us ride on your back. Can you do that? Please? For Aang?” Appa gave him a long look and rumbled in affirmation. Zuko whirled around and ran back to the carriage, skidding to a halt. “Everyone get your stuff and get on Appa, now!”

“What’s going on?” Smellerbee repeated while she leapt into the carriage and collected her things.

“We don’t have time to talk! I’ll explain later but right now you need to trust me!”

His four companions exchanged wary glances, but they did as he said and gathered their things before climbing onto Appa. Zuko unsheathed his sword, sliced the ostrich horses free from their bindings, and climbed onto Appa’s head. “How are we supposed to ride this thing?” Jet demanded.

“Hold on tight,” Zuko answered grimly. Remembering the command Katara had once given the bison to get him moving, he said, “Yip yip.” Appa took to the sky as the five passengers on his back screamed.

“Can you tell us what the hell is going on now?” Jet called to him.

“The Ocean Spirit saved my life in the North Pole,” Zuko shouted back. “I didn’t remember until just now, but it put me on that driftwood and carried me away from the fight, and healed my injuries. I think somewhere in all of that it must have – connected to me, or something, because just now, when I went to wash Appa, it showed me Aang and Azula.”

“Wait, together?” Smellerbee exclaimed in alarm.

“No – it showed me Aang, and then it showed me Azula, and she was heading right for us!”

“Where’s Aang? Is that where we’re going now?” she asked.

“I don’t know where he is. Some beach. But he and his friends are going to Ba Sing Se, so we’ll just have to meet them there.”

“Works for me!” she proclaimed.

“But… where are we going now?” Chit Sang inquired.

“…I have no idea!”

“How about Ba Sing Se?” Jet suggested. “I mean, do we really need passports if we ride in on the Avatar’s pet sky bison? Tell them we’re meeting the Avatar there?”

“That’s… That’s a really good point! I don’t think they have procedures for people flying into Ba Sing Se by extinct animal instead of taking the ferry, so let’s make sure we have passports anyway just in case!”

“In that case, can you drop me off at the nearest village?" Chit Sang put in. "I’ll make your passports and then I’ll just hang out, because I think my line of work is a lot more difficult in Ba Sing Se!”

“I’ll keep an eye out!”

Less than an hour later, they found a village and settled down a few miles away. Smellerbee and Longshot agreed to stay with Appa, so Zuko, Jet, and Chit Sang headed for the village and then the village marketplace. “Here, take this,” Zuko said to Jet, handing him two gold pieces from his money pouch. “That should be enough for whatever we need for the passports.” Jet thanked him and headed off with Chit Sang. Zuko spoke to someone about building a very large saddle, and then he purchased some writing supplies and settled down off to the side.

Aang,

Appa is safe. The Fire Lord’s daughter, Azula, is following his fur trail. I’m taking him to Ba Sing Se where she can’t get to us. I heard you’re going there too, so meet us there, okay? Fair warning: I’m traveling with three people who call themselves the Freedom Fighters. I’m told you have history with them, but they’ve assured me that they’ve changed since then, and I believe them. Still, I would protect Appa even from them if I had to. I won’t let anything happen to him.

I’ll see you soon.

- the Blue Spirit

Zuko carefully considered the amount of writing supplies he had left, and started writing a second letter.

Sela, Gansu, and Lee,

I won’t say too much in case this falls into the wrong hands. I just wanted to let you know that I am as safe as I possibly can be. I’ve remembered my promise to you and I’ve kept it to the best of my ability. I’ll write you another letter as soon as I can. I hope you’re all doing well too, although I know you can’t risk sending me a letter back. I look forward to seeing you again someday.

- Xin

“Who’re you writing to?” Jet asked nosily as he plopped down beside him.

“The Avatar,” Zuko answered.

“Why do you have two letters?”

Zuko sighed. “The Avatar and someone else.”

“Someone else who? Is it a girlfriend?”

“No.”

“A boyfriend?”

“No.” Zuko rolled his eyes. “It’s a long story, okay?”

“You have too many secrets,” Jet complained.

“I have the perfect amount of secrets,” Zuko disagreed.

“Anyway, Chit Sang is working on the passports right now using our fake names. That’s okay, right?” Jet clarified.

“It has to be. He could hardly use anything else,” Zuko pointed out. “Someone is making a saddle right now. In the meantime, we should probably pick up some food.”

“Good thinking.”

“It’s the only kind I have.” Zuko and Jet walked through the marketplace picking up food, splitting the costs evenly between the two of them, Longshot, and Smellerbee. “I’ll pay for Appa’s food,” Zuko volunteered.

Jet stopped, possibly out of surprise, but Zuko kept going, and Jet swiftly caught up with him again. After a long pause, wherein he looked very closely at Zuko and Zuko looked very determinedly away from him, Jet finally decided, “You’re way too generous for a fugitive."

Zuko shrugged. “What can I say? It’s been a good day.” They stopped by the messenger hawk rental on the way to pick up the saddle. He nearly panicked when he saw a section of a nearby wall dedicated to wanted posters, but a quick onceover revealed that his poster wasn’t up there for some reason. Zuko paid the merchant to send his two letters in two different directions, and despite his better judgment, couldn't help but tack on, “Say… do you think a messenger hawk could send a letter to someone whose name I don’t know?”

“Unlikely,” the merchant told him regretfully.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Zuko supposed he would just have to hope he ran into that blind earthbender again someday. It wasn’t too far-fetched; she knew he was headed for Ba Sing Se and she knew he wanted to be a teamaker. Still, she hadn’t sounded like she was planning on going to Ba Sing Se herself any time soon.

Zuko and Jet reached the saddle. Rather than try to balance the saddle and all of the food they'd just bought, they stored the food in the saddle. Zuko picked up one end and Jet picked up the other. When they got back, Smellerbee and Longshot had washed Appa, and Chit Sang was done with the passports. “Thanks again for rescuing me,” he said. “It was good to meet you all, and it was good to see you again, Blue.”

“Yeah, you too, Chit Sang,” Zuko answered amicably. “Take care of yourself out there. The Fire Nation is still after you, and even if they wouldn't have before, now they’ll definitely send you to the Boiling Rock if they catch you.”

“I could say the same to you,” Chit Sang pointed out.

Zuko scoffed. “There’s a reason they want me alive. Somehow I doubt I’m going anywhere as pleasant as the Boiling Rock.”

Chit Sang grimaced. “All the more reason to haul ass to Ba Sing Se.”

When he left, Zuko turned to the Freedom Fighters. “About that.”

“You still want your ostrich horse, right?” Smellerbee guessed. “Jet told us about that.”

Longshot patted his shoulder and nodded firmly.

“Thanks,” Zuko responded, feeling the corner of his lips curl despite himself.

Appa landed in the village Zuko had visited so long ago only a few days and one food stop later. “I’m giving the poor woman I saddled him with two gold pieces for her trouble,” he told Smellerbee conversationally as they headed for Dao, having left Jet and Longshot with Appa. “That pun was on purpose.”

“We’ll make an actual human out of you yet, Blueko,” she declared, patting him on the shoulder.

Zuko knocked on the door. When Sovon opened it, her jaw dropped. “After I heard what happened in the North Pole, I was positive you were dead,” she remarked. “Of course, then I knew you weren’t, because your wanted poster kept cropping up everywhere, Crown Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation.”

Zuko ignored Smellerbee’s sharp inhalation beside him even as his blood ran cold. “If you’ve seen the posters, I’m sure you know I was on the right side in that fight, too,” he pointed out.

“It seemed like a convenient cover-up for something else,” Sovon stated calmly.

“Listen, I just want Dao back. I’ve got two gold pieces.”

“…Alright. Thanks.”

Zuko paid her. She led her into the stable, and there was Dao, lifting his head immediately and trotting right for Zuko to nuzzle his shoulder. “I missed you too, buddy,” he promised, amazed by Dao’s reaction. He led Dao back to the marketplace. Smellerbee was remarkably silent the whole trip, probably still coming to terms with the newest revelation. He stopped at the edge of the marketplace and turned to her. “So. What will you do now?”

“…I don’t know,” Smellerbee admitted. “You’re the Fire Lord’s son? That terrifying girl who’s hunting the Avatar, she’s your sister?”

“Yes.”

Smellerbee rubbed the back of her neck as she eyed him pensively. “But you’re not the prince anymore because you betrayed them at the North Pole.”

“I haven’t been the prince in three years,” Zuko corrected. “When I was thirteen, I spoke out of turn at a war meeting. General Bujing wanted to send a battalion of new recruits to fight an experienced Earth Kingdom battalion as bait. I stood up and rejected his plan very, very loudly. To challenge a general in the Fire Lord’s war room is to challenge the Fire Lord, specifically to an Agni Kai – a fire duel. I refused to fight him. He burned my face and banished me.”

“Spirits,” Smellerbee exclaimed. “So that’s why you’re so vehemently against the Fire Nation.”

“No, it’s not,” Zuko stressed. “This isn’t about me. It’s about the whole world. I’m still reeling from finding out what my own father did to all these innocent people – your family, Jet’s family, Longshot’s family – Aang’s entire people – and I would do anything to stop him. He told me I could come back if I captured the Avatar. I realized afterwards that he never meant for me to come home, but still, when Aang showed up, I did try to catch him a few times – not so I could go home, but so I could go home and fix things, as the Crown Prince. And when he died, I would become Fire Lord. Now, if someone kills him, they better damn well kill Azula too.”

Smellerbee gave him a long, thoughtful look. Finally she said, “I won’t tell the others.”

Zuko’s jaw dropped. “You – really?”

“Really. Jet likes you, but he’s very narrow-minded about the Fire Nation. I’m sure you’ve noticed that. I don’t know what he’d do if he found out, but I’m not about to risk losing you based just on Jet’s prejudice. Also, I have a funny feeling Appa wouldn’t let us fly him to Ba Sing Se without you.”

“That’s probably true.”

They returned to the carriage to find Jet reading from a sheet of paper and Longshot peeling the bark off of a sapling with a knife, with a pile of peeled and unpeeled saplings on the ground, both of them leaning against Appa, who was taking a nap. Jet looked up as they arrived and got to his feet, storing the sheet of paper in his bag. “Hey guys! I guess this must be Dao!” Jet walked over and stroked Dao’s head a bit. “It’s nice to finally meet you,” he told Dao very seriously. “Zuko’s told us a lot about you.” The unfairly endearing greeting was obviously a ploy to get deeper under Zuko’s guard, but Agni help him, it was working. “Now what?” Jet asked. “To Ba Sing Se, right?”

“I guess so.”

Zuko hopped onto Appa’s head while the other three climbed back into the saddle, bringing Dao with them to tie him down up there. “Yip yip!” Zuko said. Appa roared enthusiastically and took off towards Ba Sing Se.

“Zuko, I’ve been – “

“I think we should stick together when we reach Ba Sing Se,” Zuko interrupted Jet, carefully fixing his eyes on the horizon rather than looking behind him. Dead silence answered him, and for a moment, just a moment, he wondered if he’d miscalculated. All the signs were there that they considered him a friend. They teased him, they supported him, they drank tea with him, and they seemed to trust him. Smellerbee had even agreed to keep his identity secret from the other two out of fear that Jet might send him away, so that had to mean she, at least, wanted him to stick around. The three of them were incredibly closely-knit. Smellerbee’s opinion ought to count for something – an agreement to think about it, at least, as opposed to an outright rejection.

He was partway through a mental tally of points both for and against them wanting to stay with him when Jet exclaimed, “You hear that, guys? That’s right! The Blue Spirit is a Freedom Fighter now!”

“Wait a second,” Zuko interjected automatically as his brain caught up with Jet’s words. “I didn’t sign up for that.”

“Blueko, from you, that was practically a declaration of love,” Smellerbee informed him gleefully. “You definitely signed up for that.”

Longshot tapped him on the shoulder. Zuko twisted back to look at him, and Longshot gripped the same shoulder tightly for a few seconds, smiling warmly.

“Thanks, Longshot,” Zuko replied softly, recognizing the implied welcome.

“I’m not making any tea, though,” Smellerbee announced. "Just so we're clear."

A few days later, Appa settled down on the wall of Ba Sing Se to terrified and awed stares from the military stationed up there. “What is that thing?!” someone shouted in alarm.

“A sky bison,” Zuko answered as he slid off of Appa’s head, bracing himself. “The Avatar’s sky bison, specifically.”

The man boggled at him. “Are you the Avatar?”

“No. But I’m friends with him, and he and his friends are on their way to Ba Sing Se,” Zuko informed him.

The man turned around. “Did you hear that? The Avatar’s sky bison and friends are here, and the Avatar himself is on the way!” The men and women on the wall cheered. Zuko was positive his vision from the Ocean Spirit had been accurate, but confronted with this overjoyed reaction, he suddenly really, really hoped Aang hadn’t changed his mind.

“I realize this is a bit unorthodox, but I’m not sure what the proper protocol is for flying to Ba Sing Se instead of taking the ferry,” Zuko admitted. Behind him, the other three finished untying Dao and helped him down from Appa’s saddle.

“We’ll make arrangements for you and for the Avatar when he arrives,” the man promised. “I’m General Sung.”

“I’m Xin. This is Mishing, Shoni, and Fulo.” Zuko indicated Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot in turn. “The sky bison is named Appa, and the ostrich horse is named Dao.”

“Very good to meet you, Xin, Mishing, Shoni, and Fulo. Very good indeed. There should be available lodgings in the Upper Ring to suit you for as long as you need.”

“Thank you very much, General Sung. How about work? Are there jobs available – “

General Sung waved a hand dismissively. “You don’t need to worry about that. Ba Sing Se will provide for you.”

“Sounds good to me,” Smellerbee decided.

Zuko deflated a bit. “Oh. I - I see. That doesn’t seem quite right – I mean, I wouldn’t want to impose – “

“Really, it’s no trouble – “

“I’ve been told I’m an excellent teamaker,” Zuko interrupted firmly. “I’d rather put those skills to some use, if I could, rather than living off of Ba Sing Se’s wealth.” Despite the fact that, as the blind earthbender girl he’d befriended had mentioned, his uncle’s crimes against humanity were not his, he would still feel uncomfortable benefitting so much from a city his uncle had tried to destroy in the name of the Fire Nation and the Fire Lord who had once ordered his own son to kill his own grandson. It was bad enough that he was being housed in the Upper Ring for free when there were surely many refugees who were much more deserving than him in the Middle and Lower Rings.

“Oh,” General Sung replied, taken aback. “Well, if you insist, there is an unused café in the Upper Ring. You are certainly more than welcome to make use of it.”

Stunned, Zuko didn’t know what to say. Luckily, Jet stepped forward and said, “We would appreciate that very much, General Sung.”

“Excellent. If you go right that way and take the monorail to the inner wall, someone will be waiting there to guide you.

Jet rested an arm on Zuko’s shoulder as they walked, grinning at him. “I guess we’re gonna have a family business, guys,” he declared.

“I am not making tea!” Smellerbee protested. “Spirits, that would be so boring.”

“So wait tables instead,” Jet suggested.

“That would be worse. No thanks. I’m good with having people wait on me.” They stepped onto the monorail, and as it took off, Appa took to the air beside it.

“Well, I for one am looking forward to our new family business,” Jet announced. “Teamakers by day and Freedom Fighters by night.”

“Jet, everyone here is free already,” Smellerbee pointed out.

“…Well, I’m still looking forward to it.”

“Me too,” Zuko agreed, and started when he realized that he wasn’t just saying that. He meant it. He was actually looking forward to the future he could see in front of him, the future he hadn’t believed he could have a month and a half ago. A future with the Freedom Fighters, with his tea shop, with Appa and Dao, and very soon, with Aang, Suki, Katara, and Sokka. He looked at Jet and Smellerbee still engaged in playful banter and met Longshot’s gaze, seeing his own unbearable fondness reflected there.

The monorail came to a halt, and an exuberant woman waited on the other side. “Hello, my name is Joo Dee! I have been given the great honor of showing the Avatar’s friends around Ba Sing Se. Welcome to our wonderful city. Shall we get started?”

“That’d be great, thanks,” Jet answered.

“Great! Then let’s begin our tour, and then I’ll show you to your new home here. I think you’ll like it!”

She led them to an ostrich horse-drawn carriage. Smellerbee looked at it dubiously. “I don’t think we’re all gonna fit in there.”

Longshot quirked an eyebrow at Appa.

“Flying probably isn’t the best option,” Jet disagreed. “We could just walk, though. We’ve had a nice break from walking thanks to Appa here, and I’m sure he’d rather walk than carry us around in the sky.”

“Walking is fine,” Joo Dee agreed.

They spent the day strolling through the city as Joo Dee pointed out landmarks. Eventually they reached their new house, which was right next to the café General Sung had offered them. Smellerbee dashed right in, with Jet hot on her heels, and as Zuko and Longshot entered at a more leisurely pace, Smellerbee shouted, “DIBS!” as she slammed her open palm into a bedroom door. “This one’s the best!”

“No, this one’s the best!” Jet disagreed from where he leaned against a bedroom door across from hers.

Zuko and Longshot exchanged glances and shrugged.

“One cup of ginseng tea and two cups of jasmine,” Jet announced as he entered the back of the teashop.

Longshot held two fingers in the air.

“Great, I’ll take the ginseng then,” Zuko replied.

The two of them got busy making the tea. “Oh, and one of the tables offered compliments to the chef,” Jet added. “But I can’t remember which of you made the tea.”

“Well, we’ve both gotten enough compliments over the past three days,” Zuko pointed out. “I think we’ll be okay.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Jet complained. “Way to rub in your superior tea skills. I’ll beat you one day. Just you wait.”

“Sure, and bull pigs will fly,” Zuko mocked.

“Coming through – excuse me – sorry, this is important – “ Smellerbee burst into the back. “Okay, I don’t know what’s going on, but Appa is freaking out.”

“What?” Zuko paused in his brewing, looking up at her in concern.

Smellerbee threw her hands in the air. “If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say he… wants to show us something?”

“Something like Aang,” Zuko muttered.

“You think he’s here already?” she asked in surprise. “On foot?”

Zuko shrugged. “I have no idea how close he already was when we started heading here.”

Longshot patted him on the shoulder and nodded to Smellerbee.

“Send Appa if you need us,” Jet added. “We’ll start closing up shop just in case.”

“Okay, thanks.” Zuko followed Smellerbee out of the tea shop to where Appa was pacing and rumbling ceaselessly. Zuko leapt onto Appa’s head while Smellerbee climbed into his saddle. Almost immediately, Appa threw himself into action, dodging buildings until he’d ascended higher than their tips, and then he continued ascending until they reached the outer wall, where Appa skidded to a halt on the ground so hard Zuko nearly fell off.

“Appa!” a familiar voice shrieked in delight from underneath them. “I missed you too, buddy!” Appa roared ecstatically in response.

Zuko slid off of Appa’s head and steeled himself. “Hi, Aang.”

Aang was hugging Appa’s face tightly as tears slid down his face, smiling brighter than Zuko could ever remember. He looked up at the sound of Zuko’s voice and his smile, if possible, intensififed. “Blue!” he shouted, launching himself at Zuko.

“Good to see you too,” Zuko said weakly as Aang wrapped his arms around his waist and tucked his face into his shoulder. He gingerly wrapped his arms around Aang’s back in turn, and let go just a few seconds later.

“It’s so good to see you,” Aang told him seriously. “You have no idea how happy we were to get your letters – come on, let’s go get the others, they’re at the bottom of the wall – oh, and we have a serious problem.”

“How serious?”

Aang led him to the other side of the wall and gestured, but he needn’t have bothered. As soon as he approached the edge, Zuko’s attention was completely occupied by the giant drill with the Fire Nation insignia driving towards the wall.

“Yeah, that’s serious,” Smellerbee agreed. She turned to Aang. “I know we didn’t part on great terms, but Jet, Longshot and I don’t do that kind of thing anymore. If you want our help on this, we’d be glad to do whatever we can.”

Aang gave her a long look and nodded slowly. “Yeah, I think we need all the help we can get. You two stay here – I’m going to go get the others. They’re still at the bottom of the wall.”

“Okay. Appa and I can get Jet and Longshot,” Smellerbee offered.

Aang’s eyes widened in alarm. “Uh….”

“I’ll do it,” Zuko volunteered. “S- Shoni, you go with Aang.” He caught himself at the last second, mindful of where they were.

“Right,” Smellerbee agreed, taking in Aang’s confused expression. “And maybe I’ll explain about the whole ‘Shoni’ thing while I’m at it.”

Aang hugged Zuko again, and when he pulled back, he was regarding Zuko with a seriousness he’d never worn on his face before. “You’re gonna come back this time,” he told him. “Both of you.”

Zuko raised an eyebrow at him. “Aang, it’s literally a few minutes away. We’ll be fine.” He got onto Appa and flew back to the teashop, where Jet and Longshot were leaning against the teashop expectantly. “Hey. There’s trouble. Get on.”

“Ever the talkative one,” Jet remarked as he and Longshot climbed on. “What’s this trouble?”

“A giant drill trying to penetrate the outer wall,” Zuko deadpanned.

“…You’re not kidding, are you?”

“Nope.”

“So we’ve been asked to help by the general?”

“Nope. The Avatar.”

“Oh, he is here!” Jet exclaimed. “And… his friends are here too, then. Suki, Sokka…, Katara?”

“Well, I would assume so.”

Jet hummed noncommittally.

Appa landed on the wall again, where Smellerbee waited with Aang, Suki, Katara, and Sokka waited. Suki ran forward and pulled him into a tight hug, and then she released him only to punch him in the arm, hard. “I - thought - you - were - dead!” She punctuated each word with a punch.

“What?” Zuko was flummoxed. “Why would you think that? It’s not like I was in any danger after the North Pole – “

“After the North Pole, where you ran after Zhao and we never saw you again?” Suki interrupted.

“…Uh….” Zuko looked to Aang for answers, but he didn’t seem to have any. “But… Aang saved me…? In the Avatar State…? Wait, you don’t remember?”

“No,” Aang cried. “I don’t remember anything that I did in the Avatar State! Only bits and pieces when I’m sleeping.”

“You drowned Zhao, healed my injuries, and pushed me away from the battle,” Zuko said slowly. “…If I’d known that you didn’t know, I would have written more than two words. I swear.” Although, given the context of his original letter to them... well, he probably wouldn't have, but they didn't need to know about all that.

“Well, nothing to do about it now,” Suki sighed. “I’m just glad you’re alive. But don’t ever disappear like that again, got it?”

“Got it,” Zuko agreed nervously, rubbing his arm.

She winced. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to actually hurt you.”

“You got a greeting for me?” someone else challenged.

Zuko finally noticed their fifth member, and his jaw dropped. “What? You’re traveling with the Avatar?” he exclaimed. “That didn’t seem like something to tell me?”

The blind earthbender girl shrugged. “To be fair, I was technically traveling alone when I met you.”

“What’s your name, anyway?” Zuko demanded. “How was I supposed to write to you when I reached Ba Sing Se if I didn’t know your name?”

“Oh!” The girl scratched her head. “Guess that never occurred to me. Name’s Toph.”

“Are you the blind earthbender girl who beat Zuko up and told him to make tea in Ba Sing Se?” Smellerbee asked, intrigued. "He's told us the story."

“Yep, that’s me.”

“Well, good job. Now he’s roped us all into helping out with his stupid tea shop.”

“Zuko, I’ve got something for you,” Sokka said. He took something out of his pocket and held it out.

Zuko accepted it, wide-eyed. “This – This is….”

“Your uncle’s knife,” Sokka confirmed. “I picked it up after you ran off in the North Pole. I figured that after you got my boomerang back to me, the least I could do was try and get this back to you.”

“Thank you,” Zuko said fervently. “Wait, you called me – “

“Yeah, we all know who you are now,” Katara confessed. “We’ve seen the wanted posters. It’s okay though! I mean, none of us hold it against you.”

“Well, while we’re being honest….” Zuko turned to stare at Jet in shock as the latter pulled a sheet of paper from his bag and unrolled it, revealing Zuko’s face and a far more detailed description of him and his crimes than the initial wanted poster he’d handed to Jet had contained. “I’ve seen ‘em too.”

“Wait, so just to clarify, all of you know that I’m – that I was the Fire Lord’s son,” Zuko checked.

“I never got the chance to tell Smellerbee,” Jet admitted apologetically. “Sorry – I meant to, but I never got the chance to speak to you alone – “

“That’s alright, Jet. I’ve known for about a week. I intentionally didn’t tell you because I thought you’d fly off the handle,” Smellerbee informed him cheerfully. “Glad to see I was wrong.”

“Well, you had good reason to think that.” Jet turned back to Aang and his friends with his head bowed. “I want you to know that I am so, so sorry for what I tried to do back in Gaipan, and especially what I tried to do to you, Sokka. I never stop thinking about it. If you can’t forgive me then I understand, but please forgive Longshot and Smellerbee. Their only mistake was having too much faith in me.”

“Let’s talk about that later,” Suki suggested. “For now, whether we like it or not, we need your help.”

“I’ve got a plan,” Sokka announced. “We’re gonna go inside the drill and take out the pressure points to destroy it.”

Zuko walked up to the edge of the wall and stared pensively at the drill. “If I do this…, that’s it. No turning back. I’m a full-blown traitor.”

Aang put a hand on his shoulder, frowning at him in concern. “Is… Is that okay?”

“Oh, that’s more than okay." Zuko turned to face his friends with a vicious smirk on his face. “This is what I’ve wanted all along.”

Chapter Text

'Cause I don't wanna come back
Down from this cloud
It's taken me all this time
To find out what I need

Comedown by Bush

Act 2: The Teamaker

Chapter 10: What I Need

“Okay, here’s the plan,” Sokka began as everyone huddled around him. “When we get to the bottom of the wall, Toph, you whip up some cover, get us to the drill. We look for an opening. Katara and Aang will use waterbending to take out some pressure points and Zuko will use firebending to take out others. Zuko, buddy, I can’t tell you how good it is to have a firebender on our side for once. Toph, you’ll stay on the ground where you can see and bend. Suki, you’ll come with me to watch Katara’s and Aang’s backs. Longshot, Smellerbee, you’ll stay with Zuko. To be clear, we’re not splitting up, but you two will focus on Zuko and Suki and I will focus on Katara and Aang. Jet, you’ll stay with Toph. We get in, we take out as many pressure points as we can, and we get out. Oh, and we avoid the crazy princess.”

“Wait, what?” Zuko interjected.

Katara’s jaw dropped. “Tui and La, she’s your sister, isn’t she?”

“Unfortunately,” Zuko groused. “She’s here? With the drill?”

“Yeah, and so are her two crazy friends, Ty Lee and Mai,” Katara added.

“Dammit, I don’t want to fight them,” Zuko groaned.

“You’d rather fight your own sister than her two crazy friends?” Aang questioned.

“I never liked my sister,” Zuko muttered, his skin crawling with phantom pain accompanied by the familiar sting of grief in his chest. “I liked them, once.”

“We’re obviously going to try and avoid them, so hopefully it won’t come to that.” Sokka frowned at him. “…But if we do – “

“I’ll do what I have to do,” Zuko promised. “I won’t hold back.”

“Can’t you go any faster?”

“You come over here and melt this brace, then!” Zuko snarled.

Sokka raised his hands defensively. “Okay, okay! Sorry! Sheesh.”

Zuko growled wordlessly at him and kept going.

“I think we’re almost done here,” Suki called out hopefully. “Just a few more braces and we’ll be good to go!”

“And then I’ll go deliver the finishing blast at the top,” Aang finished, sounding exhausted but relieved.

“Zuzu, what a pleasant surprise!” Zuko reacted instinctively, kicking the strongest blast he could at the speaker. Azula knocked it away easily. “Losing your touch there, brother? Oh, but that’s right – you were always this awful at firebending. Say, isn’t that why Mother died?”

“Zuko, don’t,” Smellerbee shouted in alarm, but she was drowned out by the blood rushing in Zuko’s ears. He charged forward and punched more fire at her, blast after blast after blast. It was no good; she brushed all of them off like they were nothing.

As Zuko grew closer to her, Azula readied her own firebending blast. However, when she sent it, Aang suddenly appeared in front of Zuko, twirling his staff and dissipating the fire. Someone behind Zuko yanked him backwards. “Come on!” Katara shouted in his ear. He nodded and followed her across a path of ice to the exit, Aang close behind him. As footsteps heavier than Aang’s sounded behind them, Zuko slid to the side, shoved Aang in front of him, and knocked Mai and Ty Lee away with another blast. Azula leapt over them to attack, but a strong burst of airbending went right over Zuko’s head, knocking her back. Zuko and Aang followed the others back out of the room.

They made four or five turns through the labrynth of hallways before coming to a stop. “Guys, get out of here,” Aang told them all. “I know what I need to do.”

Katara nodded and tossed her waterskin to him. “You need this more than I do.”

“I’m going with you,” Zuko informed him. “You’ll need backup when Azula comes after you.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

“See you on the other side,” Suki said grimly. She led the others down one hallway, and Zuko and Aang took another.

“So you opened your own tea shop?” Aang chirped.

“Is now really the time to talk?” Zuko snapped. At the crestfallen look on Aang’s face, he hastily corrected, “Not that I don't want to talk to you! Just - maybe not when we’re about to die.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right about that.”

Zuko and Aang made their way out of the drill and to the top, where boulders were crashing down all around them. “Hey, watch it!” Zuko shouted, glaring at the top of the wall.

“General Sung, please, tell your men to stop!” Aang called up to the general and his men. There was no acknowledgment. “I guess we’re stuck.”

“Do what you have to do,” Zuko said. “I’ve got your back.” Aang got to work using Katara’s water to slice up the drill while Zuko guarded him from the falling boulders. A blast of blue fire rushed right past him, nearly hitting Aang, but Zuko kicked through it with his own red fire just in time. “Azula,” he hissed.

“What an observant little traitor you are, Zuzu,” Azula sneered.

“Azula?”

“Keep going, Aang!” Zuko insisted, readying himself in a fighting stance. “I’ve got this.”

“Is that so?” Azula went through a dauntingly familiar motion with her hands and arms. “Then by all means, have it!”

Lightning crackled at her fingertips, and she pointed it directly at Zuko. Cursing, Zuko whirled around, jerked Aang into his arms, and threw them off the side of the drill. As lightning shot past them, he unsheathed his sword and stabbed the drill, getting a good enough grip to keep them from falling too far. He threw Aang back up. Aang reached down to tug him up too as he removed his sword from the drill and sheathed it. “Is that all you got?” he shouted at Azula. She responded by raising both of her hands and dragging them diagonally down towards each other, building up blue flames as she released them in a ferocious blast. Zuko dropped backwards into a low crouch on his hands and spun his legs, dispelling the fire with his own.

As he did so, Azula leapt over his head at Aang, who was cutting at a boulder now. She brought one hand down in a blurry blaze, but Aang caught a boulder in one hand and slammed it into her hand. The boulder shattered, but Aang was okay, and it bought Zuko enough time to summon a fiery whip and lash it at her back. Azula landed on her feet before Aang and kicked behind her at the whip, blocking it with her flames. Before she had quite finished, Zuko kicked fire at her. She caught it just in time and redirected it towards him. While her back was turned to him, Aang snaked Katara’s water around her ankle and yanked her off-balance. Taking advantage of her momentary distraction, Zuko tackled her and knocked her right off of the drill. They landed in a puddle of sludge at the bottom. As Zuko spluttered, having fallen face-first, Azula leapt gracefully to her feet and punched flames right at his head, which he just barely managed to knock away with one fist as he rolled over.

Azula lifted another fist, glowing blue, but before she could strike Zuko again, she had to dodge one, two, three arrows. Then Suki and Jet were there with her fans and his hooked swords, and before Zuko even had the chance to rejoin the fight, a large blast of airbending sent a wave of sludge onto all of them. As they recovered, the drill suddenly stopped, and sludge burst from every crevice. Of all the ways Zuko had nearly drowned in the past half a year alone, he didn’t intend to put sludge on the list of potential culprits. He took Suki and Jet by the backs of their shirts, leapt into the air, and kicked fire at the drill, knocking all three of them out of the way in the nick of time. Azula escaped too, naturally, but Appa swooped down and slammed his tail on the ground right beside her, knocking her off of her feet and into the sludge. Zuko, Suki, and Jet hastily climbed into his saddle. Aang leapt off of the drill and landed neatly on Appa’s head. “Yip yip!” They swung around to pick Smellerbee, Longshot, Toph, Sokka, and Katara up as well, and then they darted back up to the outer wall.

When they got up there, they all exchanged glances before bursting into adrenaline-induced laughter. Jet hung his arm around Zuko’s neck while Suki ruffled his hair. “It’s good to have you back, Blue,” she told him.

“I thought you were gonna be toast for a minute there,” Jet commented, and then cackled evilly.

“Have you seen my face?” Zuko asked incredulously. “Did that really seem like an appropriate joke?”

Aang threw himself over the side of the saddle and gleefully pulled Zuko into another hug. The positioning was a bit awkward since Aang’s legs were strewn across Suki’s lap and Zuko fell onto Jet’s shoulder, but neither of them seemed to mind, so Zuko hugged him back. Aang rolled off of him and collapsed onto his back in the middle of the saddle. “What now?” he asked cheerfully. “Oh, right. The Earth King. The eclipse.”

“Eclipse?” Smellerbee questioned curiously.

“There’s an eclipse coming,” Aang explained. “During the eclipse, for a few minutes, all firebenders will lose their bending.”

“That’s when you’re going to kill my father,” Zuko realized out loud, shocked. Everyone turned to him, slack-jawed. “What? Don’t look at me like that. I’ve wanted him dead since – honestly, I can’t remember wanting him alive. If I’d had the means I probably would have done away with him myself a long time ago. I mean, you’ve all seen my face. Why wouldn’t I want him dead?”

“Wait a second,” Sokka interjected, his voice dangerously low. “That was your father?”

Zuko shrugged. “As Toph once said, my father is ‘the evilest evil to ever evil.’ I don’t know why everyone is so surprised when I tell them that.”

“Zuko, your hand,” Katara said in alarm. Zuko looked down at his hand, the one he’d used to block Azula’s last attack when he was on the ground, and realized it hurt. There was a burn – he must have been hit by some of the fire instead of pushing it away. “Aang, can you pass me the waterskin?”

“Oh, sure!” Aang sat up for a second, pulled the waterskin off of him, and tossed it to her.

Katara scooted closer to Zuko and waterbended the water onto her hands before placing them gently on Zuko’s hand. The pain quickly receded, leaving not even the smallest trace of the burn when she pulled away.

Jet whistled. “That is a neat new trick.”

Katara glared at him. Jet withered, falling silent. Zuko had never seen him wrong-footed before, so it was incredibly satisfying to snicker at his discomfort for once.

“Okay, let’s go talk to the Earth King,” Sokka declared. “The sooner, the better.”

Aang climbed back onto Appa’s head. “Yip yip!”

Appa leapt from the wall and glided right to the palace. A man in long, dark green robes with a braid hanging down his back greeted them with a warm smile. “I am Long Feng, Grand Secretariat of Ba Sing Se and head of the Dai Li. It is my supreme honor to meet the Avatar and his friends.”

“Hi, Long Feng,” Aang replied enthusiastically. “My name’s Aang. This is Suki, the leader of the Kyoshi Warriors, Sokka and Katara of the Southern Water Tribe, Toph Beifong, Z- um, Xin, Shoni, Mishing, and Fulo. We have urgent news for the Earth King about the war.”

“I regret to inform you that the Earth King is not currently available. However, as his advisor, I would be more than happy to listen to your information.”

Aang exchanged glances with Suki, then Katara, then Sokka. He turned back to Long Feng. “Well, okay.”

“Excellent. Right this way, everyone.” Long Feng led them into the palace and then off to the side down a long hallway. At the end was an office, presumably his. “I’m afraid I don’t have enough seating for all of you.”

“That’s alright,” Katara assured him. “We’ll be okay standing.”

“So, what is this urgent news?”

“There’s an eclipse coming.” Sokka launched into a detailed explanation of their venture into a secret library in the Si Wong Desert and discovery of the ‘Day of Black Sun,’ as he called it. He finished with, “If we want to end this war, we have to invade the Fire Nation during the eclipse so that Aang can take out the Fire Lord once and for all.”

“While this sounds like an excellent foundation for a plan, I’m afraid Ba Sing Se will not be assisting you in this matter.”

“What?” Suki demanded. “Didn’t you hear him? This is the only way to end the war!”

“There is no war in Ba Sing Se,” Long Feng retorted.

“Okay, we just stopped a giant drill from burrowing right through the outer wall,” Toph protested in disbelief. “The only reason the war isn’t in Ba Sing Se yet is because we just stopped it from entering!”

“And I appreciate that,” Long Feng snapped. “All the same, Ba Sing Se is not involving itself in the war at this moment.”

“Ba Sing Se is already in the war!” Smellerbee exploded. “Where’s the king? If you won’t listen to us, we’ll talk to him instead.”

“You will do no such thing,” Long Feng asserted. “The Earth King has no time to get involved in political squabbles and the day-to-day minutia of military activities. What’s most important to His Royal Majesty is maintaining the cultural heritage of Ba Sing Se. All his duties relate to issuing decrees on such matters. It’s my job to oversee the rest of the city’s resources, including the military.”

“Well, you’re obviously not any good at it,” Zuko informed him heatedly. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“Wait, so this king is just a figurehead,” Katara realized out loud.

“He’s your puppet!” Toph exclaimed.

“His Majesty is an icon, a god to his people,” Long Feng bit out. “He can’t sully his hands with the hourly change of an endless war.”

“It doesn’t have to be endless,” Suki pressed desperately. “We can end it!”

“Enough! No more about your ridiculous plan. Until now, your friends have been treated as honored guests. I recommend you cease this nonsense if you want to maintain that status, lest you find yourself an enemy of Ba Sing Se instead.”

Aang opened his mouth to argue, but Suki gripped his shoulder hard enough that Zuko could see her fingers pressing into his skin through his clothes. “Fine. I can see we’re not welcome here. We’ll be on our way.”

“Yes, you do that,” Long Feng agreed hostilely.

Suki pulled Aang out of the room, and the rest of them trailed after them, exchanging confused glances. When they got to the main room, Aang pulled away from Suki as they huddled together and he hissed, “What was that? Why did we give up?”

“I can tell when a man is too self-righteous to listen to reason, and that is Long Feng to a ‘T,’” Suki muttered. “Here’s how I see it. I’m the leader of the Kyoshi Warriors. Sokka and Katara are the son and daughter of the chief of the Southern Water Tribe. Toph is the most badass earthbender in the world. Zuko is the son of the Fire Lord himself. Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot, for all their faults, led a group of kids against the Fire Nation for years. Aang, you’re the Avatar. And we’re already in the palace right now.”

“So what are you thinking?” Aang asked warily.

“I’m thinking that we’re done asking permission.”

Toph grinned and cracked her knuckles. “I like where this is going.”

“What if the Earth King won’t listen to us either?” Aang worried.

“Then it doesn’t matter either way, and we’re done in Ba Sing Se,” Sokka said slowly. “But the way I see it, that’s where we are if we don’t talk to him anyway. I’m with you, Suki.”

“Me too,” Zuko put in.

“You know I’m all for breaking the rules,” Jet commented.

Smellerbee and Longshot locked eyes for a few seconds, then turned back to the group. “Longshot and I are in,” Smellerbee announced.

“It’s the best plan we’ve got,” Katara agreed.

“Well, if all of you think this is a good idea…, okay. Let’s do it,” Aang decided. “Ready?” Everyone voiced their assent, so Aang pulled out his bison whistle and blew on it.

Appa burst through the palace doors. Long Feng rushed towards them, surrounded by Dai Li agents. “What is the meaning of this?” he demanded.

“We will speak with the Earth King,” Suki declared. She whipped out her fans. “And no one is getting in our way!”

Zuko unsheathed his sword, mindful of his secret identity as the nonbender Xin. Jet drew his hook swords, Smellerbee drew her daggers, Longshot drew his bow, and Sokka drew his – “A boomerang?” Zuko demanded. “What, the machete wasn’t a dumb enough weapon? You had to go dumber?”

Sokka didn’t get the chance to reply. “Dai Li, attack!” Long Feng roared. Zuko quickly blocked a volley of earth hands with his sword, but he felt himself skidding backwards each time, pushed by the force of the blocks. He really wished he had the other half of his sword. They were thoroughly outnumbered by the Dai Li, but Toph’s earthbending was enough to level the playing field. From what Zuko could see between dodges and strikes, she really was immensely talented.

“Over here!” Sokka shouted. Zuko looked up to see Sokka and Longshot at the top of a pile of rubble caused by Toph and Aang’s earthbending. “These doors are too fancy not to lead anywhere!”

Zuko dashed forward and darted up the rubble with quick steps, light enough to avoid dislodging any of it and causing trouble for his teammates behind him. Aang and Toph were right behind him, and they drew two pillars of rock from the ground diagonally into the doors hard enough to slam them open. The Earth King, presumably, sat before them in a large throne with Long Feng already at his side. “We need to talk to you,” Aang declared firmly. Zuko took a second to admire the confidence he asserted with, the authority he commanded within the Earth King’s own palace. Already, he had developed incredible leadership skills and maturity in the time since Zuko had last seen him.

“They’re here to overthrow you,” Long Feng told the Earth King.

"King Kuei, that is absolutely not true," Suki protested, leaning forward. "We're on your side. If you would just hear us out - "

“Hear you out?” the Earth King challenged incredulously, standing. “Who in their right mind - "

"We're not just some random intruders," Suki said urgently, gesturing to Aang. "We're with the Avatar. Your kingdom is at war, Your Highness! We just saved the last free city in the Earth Kingdom - your city - from a giant drill. I know how this looks, but you owe it to us and to your people to hear us out!"

The Earth King stared at her, flabbergasted. "War? Giant drill? What are you talking about?" He held a hand up. "Everyone, stop fighting and put down your weapons!"

Zuko hesitated, looking around at the hostile Dai Li agents and Long Feng, who stood beside the Earth King, glowering at them. A quick scan of his friends' faces revealed similar trepidation in their features.

"You're the ones who attacked us," the king reminded them sharply. "If you want me to trust you after all this, you're going to have to trust me first."

...Unfortunately, that was fair and frankly inarguable. Zuko looked to Suki, and she looked back at him with furrowed eyebrows, a clear question in her eyes. He nodded. She glanced at each of their friends in turn and received the same affirmation, so she slowly crouched and set her weapons down, and the rest of them followed suit.

"Detain the assailants - "

"Wait," the king commanded, interrupting Long Feng, much to the advisor's visible chagrin. He faced Aang. "You, young man - you're the Avatar?"

"That's right, your earthiness!

"Preposterous," Long Feng blustered. "The Avatar hasn't been seen in - "

Aang quickly demonstrated first waterbending, then earthbending.

"Lying jerk," Toph muttered mutinously. Katara shushed her and smacked her on the arm. Zuko hoped dearly that the king hadn't heard.

"Even so," Long Feng pressed, "they're enemies of the state, Your Highness. You can't trust them based on nothing but - but fancy accolades and begrudging shows of trust!"

Fancy accolades? Smellerbee mouthed, incredulous. Jet shrugged minutely in response.

"Perhaps you're right," the king mused. He visibly waffled about the situation, and there was a moment when Zuko wondered if they would have to take up arms once more and make him listen, loathe as he was to try and start an alliance through force. Luckily, the king's pet bear showed them mercy in the form of approaching Aang and licking him. "Though Bosco seems to like him.... I'll hear what he has to say."

Aang hastily dove into a brief summary of the war and the explanation Long Feng had given them less than an hour ago, finishing with, "It’s a conspiracy to control the city, and to control you.”

The Earth King laughed. “A secret war? That’s crazy!”

“Completely,” Long Feng agreed enthusiastically.

“Long Feng told us himself just minutes ago when we tried to speak with you,” Suki added. “He was trying to stop you from finding out!”

“This is a difficult claim to believe, even from the Avatar and his allies….” The Earth King shook his head.

“We can prove the war is real,” Sokka pressed. “Earlier today, the Fire Nation tried to drill right through the outer wall. The drill is probably still there. If you just let us take you to the outer wall, we can show you!”

The Earth King hesitated, frowning. “I… I have to trust my advisor….”

“We’re not expecting you to believe us just because of who we are,” Zuko put in.

“Well, no wonder,” Long Feng retorted. “You, yourself, are the son of the Fire Lord, aren’t you?”

“What does that matter if there is no war?” Zuko shot back, though his stomach roiled with trepidation at the thought that Long Feng knew who he was, had maybe known all along. He turned back to the Earth King. “I understand that you trust your advisor, but you are the king, not him. You owe it to your city, to yourself, to investigate this.”

“No Earth King has ever been to the outer wall,” the Earth King insisted. “It just isn’t done.”

“It’s never had a reason to be done before,” Katara pointed out. “But some things have to come before tradition. Don’t you think this is one of them?”

“She’s right,” the Earth King decided. “I will at least look at the outer wall before I turn you away.”

Zuko breathed a sigh of relief, nearly falling to his knees. “Thank you,” Aang said, looking just as relieved.

They all boarded the train except for Aang, who rode Appa. When they reached the outer wall, the drill was still there, plain as day. The Earth King stared down at it in horror. “I can’t believe this,” he whispered harshly. He turned away, looking lost. “I never knew….”

“I can explain this, Your Majesty,” Long Feng told him urgently. “This is nothing more than a… construction project.”

“Then explain the Fire Nation insignia,” Jet snarled, gesturing violently.

“Well, it’s imported, of course,” Long Feng bluffed as the Earth King narrowed his eyes suspiciously at him. “You know you can’t trust domestic machinery…. Surely you don’t believe these children instead of your most loyal attendant?”

“Dai Li!” The Earth King called to his men, straightening his back and lifting his chin. “Arrest Long Feng! I want him to stand trial for crimes against the Earth Kingdom!”

Later that night, after joining the Earth King at his palace to discuss their invasion plan with him and have it approved, they retired to the teashop to celebrate. “Would you like some tea?” Zuko asked everyone.

“Hey, this is actually an appropriate time to ask that,” Toph mused.

Zuko frowned at her. “Was last time an inappropriate time to ask?”

“Zuko, I snuck up on you, shot the ground up from under your feet, and threw you three feet away onto your back.”

“…I… don’t understand. That made it inappropriate?”

“Well, not bad-inappropriate, but kind of out-of-place-inappropriate, yeah. I mean, I’m not complaining. You make good tea.”

“Zuko and I got into a fight about his conversational skills once,” Jet put in. “He basically told me to shut up – “

“I did not - “

“ – and then a few seconds later he walked over and offered me tea.”

“What is it with you and tea?” Smellerbee wondered out loud.

Zuko shrugged. “Listen, as I’m sure all of you can tell, I’m not exactly an expert at talking to people. But not once has someone been insulted, offended, or otherwise upset when I offered them tea.”

“As abrasive as you are sometimes, I’m surprised you even care about that,” Sokka joked.

Zuko rubbed his left wrist absently. “I wasn’t exactly myself back when the habit formed.”

Sokka raised an eyebrow at him. “What does that mean?”

Zuko was blessedly saved from responding by Longshot’s arrival with a platter of tea – Zuko hadn’t even noticed him leaving, which he felt a bit bad about. “Thanks, Longshot.” Zuko accepted a cup and sniffed it. “Ginseng. Good choice. That was my uncle’s favorite.”

“That’s right!” Suki blurted out. “Your uncle, he was the Dragon of the West?”

Zuko grimaced. “I know that’s not a ringing endorsement. I can’t really defend him, either. All I know is that his son, my cousin, Lu Ten, died in the siege of Ba Sing Se, and soon after he called it off. Afterwards, all he seemed to be interested in was tea, Pai Sho, and spirits. Even once I realized just how wrong our family was… my uncle and my mother, they’re the only two people in the world who ever cared about me. My father obviously never did. My sister did, maybe, when she was very little, but she certainly doesn’t anymore and hasn’t in years. I can hardly even remember my cousin. My grandfather ordered my death and was only stopped by my mother poisoning him and framing a servant. The closest things I ever had to friends were Mai and Ty Lee, and as you can see they’re more Azula’s friends than mine and they always have been. So, yeah, my uncle wasn’t the greatest guy, but he’s important to me. Was important to me.”

“My great-aunt is an ableist bull pig,” Suki revealed. “I still love her, though. I guess that’s not really as bad, but it’s still pretty shitty. So I guess I know what you mean.”

Sokka shrugged. “Hey, no judgment here. As long as you’re not planning to go the same route – and obviously you’re not, since you literally helped us save Ba Sing Se earlier today, so that was a stupid thing to say, sorry – anyway, I don’t care who you care about.”

“And it inspired your incredible tea-making skills, so it’s definitely okay with me,” Toph piped up.

Suki set her cup down. “Not to ruin the mood, but there’s something we need to talk about.” She looked directly at Jet. “Jet, Smellerbee, Longshot, you three helped us today, and that’s definitely not nothing…, but we can’t just forget about what you did before. It at least merits a discussion.”

Zuko tensed. Aang frowned at him, then turned to Suki. “Zuko trusts them.”

“Zuko is not the only member of this group,” Suki told him amusedly, which was strange, because Zuko hadn’t known he was a member of their group at all. He wondered where that would leave him if Aang and his friends couldn’t forgive the Freedom Fighters. He didn’t really want to think about it.

“Aang’s not wrong though,” Sokka reasoned. “And that’s an important point in their favor.”

Seeing that his opinion was obviously worth something to them, Zuko decided to take part in the discussion. “For what it’s worth, I wouldn’t be here without Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot. I wouldn’t be alive without them.”

“That’s an exaggeration,” Smellerbee disagreed. “I mean, I appreciate it, but that’s an exaggeration.”

“It’s really not.” Zuko reached for his left wrist again self-consciously. He had almost forgotten, in the midst of everyone knowing he was the Blue Spirit and the former Crown Prince, that he had one secret left.

“I’ve seen you in action, Blueko. You can definitely take care of yourself. You don’t need us.”

“Yes, I do,” Zuko asserted.

“Whether he does or not, he clearly feels that he does, which is good enough for me,” Aang voiced. “I trust Zuko, and Zuko trusts you three, and he believes you’ve changed. I can’t speak for all of us, but I, for one, am ready to forgive you.”

“I wasn’t even there, so I’ve got nothing to say,” Toph put in.

Suki turned to Katara and Sokka. “You two were hurt the most, and I’ll support you no matter how you feel about this…, but I’m ready to forgive, too.”

Sokka looked to Katara. “What do you say?”

Katara shook her head. “I can’t say I forgive you for what you nearly did to that poor town, but…, you really did help today. And you all really do seem to have changed. So if you want to keep helping us, well, we can use all the help we can get.”

Jet visibly relaxed, grinning widely at her. She rolled her eyes.

“I’ve been meaning to ask – what happened at the North Pole?” Zuko inquired. “I saw Zhao kill the Moon Spirit before I went after him, but I got knocked out during the fight and when I woke up, suddenly the moon was there again. How did that happen?”

“It was Princess Yue,” Katara explained nervously, glancing at Sokka, who held his tea closer and stared intensely at it. “I think you met her.”

“Yeah, I think I remember her.”

“She was deathly sick as an infant, but when her parents brought her to the spirit oasis, the Moon Spirit healed her, which was why her hair was so pale. When the Moon Spirit died, she realized that she had some of the Moon Spirit’s life in her, so she gave it back.”

“She sacrificed herself to bring the moon back,” Sokka murmured. Suki put an arm around his shoulders.

“Excuse me,” Aang mumbled suddenly. He got up and stepped outside, leaving his half-finished cup of tea behind. Zuko glanced around worriedly; Suki, Sokka, and Katara were all looking after Aang anxiously, and even Toph looked a bit concerned. Zuko leaned towards Suki and whispered, “Can I – Should I - ?”

“Yes,” she whispered back, touching his shoulder and smiling at him. “Go.”

Zuko set down his tea and excused himself as well. He followed Aang outside to where he stood, leaning against Appa’s side with his face in his fur. “Aang, are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Aang mumbled, turning to give him the fakest smile he’d ever seen. “Just wanted to give Appa a little attention.”

“Are you sure that’s it?” Zuko challenged not unkindly, leaning against Appa on Aang’s left. “All day, you’ve seemed different. Different in a good way, in some ways, and in other ways – well, not in a bad way, but maybe in a… concerning way. I mean, concerning because I care - because I... value your... emotional well-being. As your friend.”

Aang gave him a half-hearted but genuine smile then. “I’m still kind of reeling from you and Appa being alive and well, honestly. I knew that a few days ago, but I guess I didn’t really believe it until today. I….” He hesitated, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth, and then he confessed in a hushed voice, “I killed so many people at the North Pole, Zuko. So many. I didn’t – I didn’t mean to, but I was in the Avatar State, and I couldn’t control anything I did…. It was terrible.”

“I’m sorry you had to go through that,” Zuko said honestly. “It wasn’t right for the Ocean Spirit to use you like that.”

“She had to protect her home,” Aang disagreed. “I wish she hadn’t killed them all, but she did have to use me.”

“I just wish you didn’t have to go through all this,” Zuko muttered. “It’s not right, not any of it. You shouldn’t have to do all this.”

“Well, at least I’ve got you guys,” Aang said, smiling fully. “A burden shared is a burden halved, right? So now, it’s a burden… ninthed.”

“I don’t think that’s a word, Aang.”

“It is now.”

“That’s not how language works.”

“I’m the Avatar, Zuko, I think I’m allowed to make up new words.”

Zuko shook his head, laughing lightly at Aang's ridiculousness. “I don't even know where to begin to form an argument with that.”

Zuko woke up the next morning with an oddly-shaped pillow that hadn’t been there when he’d fallen asleep. When he rolled over, he hit a barrier: another human body. He froze. That definitely hadn’t been there when he’d gone to bed, and he felt like he probably should have woken up for someone crawling into bed with him. He slowly sat up and turned to see Katara shifting beside him, pulling her arm away from where it had been under his head. He had so many questions, but the first one he asked was, “Don’t you have pajamas?”

She blinked up at him slowly. “Well, yeah, but I wasn’t expecting to need them when I came over last night.”

“…Right…, and… why did you come over last night…?”

She rose into a sitting position bringing them shoulder-to-shoulder. “I guess you don’t remember anything?” He shook his head. “You, uh, you had a nightmare and set your bedroom door on fire – “

Zuko turned to the door, which was, indeed, nonexistent.

“ – so Longshot came to make sure you were okay, and, well, please don’t feel bad about this because we both know it wasn’t on purpose and neither of us blame you for it – “

Zuko shot out of bed, whirling to face her in horror. “Did I hurt him?!”

“It was an accident,” Katara insisted, “you didn’t mean to, you were asleep – “

“Is he okay?!”

“He’s fine, Zuko! He came to get me immediately so I could put some water on it. It wasn’t a bad burn. He’s completely fine now.”

“I don’t understand – that still doesn’t explain why you would sleep next to me, especially after that!”

“I thought you might be feeling phantom pain in your scar, so I tried putting water on it, and, well….” Katara flushed. “You rolled over onto my hand. So I couldn’t really move without disturbing you. It worked, though, so I guess I was probably right.” She looked terribly pleased with herself. Zuko couldn’t bring himself to tell her it was probably just because his mother was the only person to ever have touched his face without hurting him.

“…Thanks,” Zuko muttered, rubbing his face with both hands.

“If you want, we can tell everyone that you came to get me because your hand was hurting from that burn yesterday and asked me to heal it, and then I just stayed because it was so late.”

Zuko waved a hand dismissively. “I don’t care what you tell everyone. It’s probably better that everyone knows to stay away from me while I’m sleeping.” He wandered out of the bedroom to use the bathroom, and when he left, Katara was gone. He got dressed and he reached the teashop just an hour before opening time and found all of his friends already there, including Katara.

“Guess what?” Toph said excitedly to him as soon as he walked through the doors.

He had never heard her excited before, so his curiosity was piqued at once. “What happened?”

“I got a letter from my mom. She said she’s in Ba Sing Se and she wants to see me.”

“That’s great news, Toph,” Zuko told her sincerely. “You think she’s ready to talk about you using your earthbending?”

“It looked like it,” Sokka replied. “She seemed really enthusiastic about Toph teaching the Avatar to earthbend.”

Once they finished eating breakfast, Toph said her goodbyes and headed out. “What now?” Katara asked the group at large.

“The Earth King wanted us to meet with him later today to discuss the invasion with his generals,” Suki reminded everyone. “As the leader of the Kyoshi Warriors, I should probably go. You too, Zuko, since you know the most about the Fire Nation. Oh, and Aang, obviously, being the Avatar.”

“Katara and I should probably go too as members of Team Avatar,” Sokka declared importantly.

“That’s not going to catch on, sweetie,” Suki informed him sadly. “But you are right.”

“The three of us can run the teashop for the day, Zuko,” Jet volunteered.

Suki frowned. “Maybe we should all go for today – although… Toph’s not here anyway. We could alternate staying here and helping plan every day. I do know how to make tea well enough. We’ll probably be here until the invasion, so it would make sense for us to have something to do to earn our keep.”

“Uh, how about being the Avatar and his friends?” Sokka pointed out.

“Exactly!” Smellerbee exclaimed, gesturing violently at him.

“I for one would like to have a little spending money without feeling like I’m taking advantage of Ba Sing Se’s wealth,” Katara disagreed, scowling at her brother. “Wealth that could be better spent on the war effort.”

“How much are you expecting to spend?” Sokka retorted.

“Anyone who doesn’t want to help doesn’t have to,” Zuko put in mildly.

“I want to!” Aang chirped, beaming at him.

“Thank you, Aang.”

Zuko, Aang, Suki, Katara, and Sokka headed over to the war meeting while Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot stayed to run the teashop. “Welcome, Avatar and friends!” King Kuei greeted them happily. “This is the Council of Five, my highest-ranking generals: General How, General Ru, General Sung, General Laan, and General Gur. Generals, this is Avatar Aang, Sokka and Katara of the Southern Water Tribe, Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation, and Suki of the Kyoshi Warriors.”

“Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation?” General How echoed suspiciously.

“Former Prince,” Zuko corrected calmly. “I was banished from the Fire Nation three years ago, when my father, the Fire Lord, gave me this scar.” He briefly touched his scar before lowering his hand. “I assure you, I feel no loyalty towards the Fire Nation or its leadership. My loyalty now is to the Avatar and his allies.”

General How’s eyes softened at Zuko’s story, and he was nodding when Zuko finished speaking. “Avatar Aang, can you confirm all this?”

“Yes, sir,” Aang affirmed gladly. “Zuko has been an ally and a friend for as long as I’ve known him. He’s saved my friends and me countless times. When I went to Avatar Roku’s temple on Crescent Island to speak with him, Zuko helped Suki and me escape from the Fire Nation admiral who was chasing us, and later infiltrated the admiral’s stronghold when I was captured in order to rescue me. He infiltrated that same admiral’s very own ship in order to get to the North Pole to help us defend the Northern Water Tribe from the Fire Nation’s siege.”

“He saved this very city just yesterday, General How,” General Sung piped up surprisingly. “Though I was unaware of his identity at the time, I watched him defend the Avatar from the Fire Lord’s daughter Princess Azula, who I now know to be his own sister, and it nearly cost him his life.”

“Well, I can hardly ignore such glowing recommendations from the Avatar himself and one of my own generals,” General How declared. “Welcome aboard, Prince Zuko. Your aid will surely be invaluable.”

“I certainly hope so,” Zuko agreed. “But I’m no prince. Just Zuko is fine.”

“When we defeat Fire Lord Ozai,” General Gur mused, “will you take over as Fire Lord?”

Zuko’s jaw dropped as everyone turned to stare at him. Though that had been the plan months ago when capturing Aang and bringing him to the Fire Nation was still an option, it hadn’t occurred to him that, should they succeed, that was still on the table. This new plan would see his ascension much, much sooner than he had ever contemplated. Zuko shook his head to clear it of those thoughts. “Technically, Azula is next in the line of succession. It might be more appropriate to allow her to take his place and give her the chance to end the war and strive for peace. Unfortunately, she's far more likely to continue the war in Fire Lord Ozai's place. It really wouldn’t be proper for me to take the throne. Whether right or wrong, I was disowned. My grandfather Azulon had a younger sister named Misazi. I don’t know whether she had any children. She never had any interest in politics as far as I can recall from my grandfather’s and father’s stories, but if we could find her once we defeat Ozai and Azula, she might be willing to either become Fire Lord or reinstate me as the Crown Prince so that I may become Fire Lord.”

General How nodded slowly. “That does make sense. If feasible, we will strive to adhere to your recommendations, although, with your consent, I reserve the right to recommend skipping certain steps to instate you as Fire Lord.”

“If necessary, you will have it when the time comes,” Zuko promised, though his stomach was doing backflips. Aang smiled brightly at him, probably with the intention of being supportive, but the backflips only intensified.

“We will have to send word to all corners of the Earth Kingdom and summon as many of our armies as we can for the invasion,” General How went on.

“I’ll send word to my warriors,” Suki offered. “However many women they can spare, I’m sure they will gladly.”

“We can send word to the North Pole, too,” Sokka added. “I bet they’ll help.”

“Oh!” Katara exclaimed. “And our father is the Chief of the Southern Water Tribe. He and his men went off to fight in the war years ago, but if we can find him and his men, I know they’ll help.”

“I understand you don’t draft soldiers here in the Earth Kingdom, but if any civilians wanted to volunteer just for this one fight, even as maintenance or something like that, I could teach them basic fighting skills,” Zuko volunteered. He patted his half of a sword, sheathed at his waist. “I have experience as a swordsmanship teacher.”

“That’s an unusual idea, but I will most assuredly take it into consideration,” General How decided. “As for you three, any forces you can pull to our cause will be greatly appreciated.”

“Most benders don’t fight with a weapon,” General Ru commented.

“I’m not most benders,” Zuko answered. “Despite being younger than me, Azula has always been a better firebender than I've been. I was drawn to swordsmanship by my desire to be better than her at something. Over the past three years, while I’ve kept up with my firebending training, swordsmanship has been my primary fighting style.” He grimaced regretfully. “Technically, this is only half of a sword. I lost the other half in the North Pole. I usually fight with a pair of blades, not just one.”

“You should have seen this guy in action when he had ‘em both,” Sokka boasted. “I mean, he’s great with just one, but with two? He was unstoppable.”

“We can certainly provide you with a new pair of swords,” General Ru mused. “What do you prefer?”

“Uh, dao blades,” Zuko said, surprised and still reeling from Sokka’s glowing, unsolicited praise. “Thank you.”

“I would be interested in a demonstration of your skills, Prince Zuko, at your convenience,” General Ru told him. “It’s always beneficial to spar with those of varying fighting styles. I’m sure my men would appreciate the opportunity to fight with someone who was taught dual wielding in the Fire Nation.”

“I am more than willing to help however you see fit,” Zuko replied.

“This is certainly an awesome moment in Earth Kingdom history,” General Sung declared. “For the first time in a very, very long time, the end of the war is in sight!”

The five of them exchanged excited glances. Zuko wondered if the others could possibly be feeling as content as he did. Not only was the end of the war in sight, but when it did end, Zuko could see clearer than ever before a path towards peace and prosperity for all four nations with his friends at his side.

Chapter Text

The trouble, it might drag you down
If you get lost, you can always be found
Just know you're not alone
'Cause I'm gonna make this place your home

Home by Phillip Phillips

Act 2: The Teamaker

Chapter 11: You Can Always Be Found

Toph soon returned from her ‘visit’ with her ‘parents’ with the ability to bend metal. Over the next two weeks, they continued meeting with the generals and running the tea shop in shifts, and once Zuko was given a new pair of well-crafted dao blades, he passed his old blade to Sokka and began teaching him how to use it. Zuko, Aang, Jet, Smellerbee, Toph, and Sokka were meeting with General How, General Ru, and General Laan when after half a day of work, General How received an urgent visitor. In lieu of having them continue with General Ru and General Laan, General How said, “You’ve all been working hard. Why don’t you kids take the rest of the day off?”

“Thank you, sir!” Aang darted out of the room. The rest of them followed more sedately, although Aang darted back in, latched onto Zuko’s hand, and dragged him out at an accelerated pace. “Day off! What should we do today?”

“First, it’s only half a day off, since we already worked on the plans for half of today,” Sokka corrected. “Second, Aang, buddy, it’s been two weeks. You can’t be that desperate for a break already.”

“I know! I know!” Aang cheered, completely ignoring Sokka, who slapped his own forehead. “Toph, teach me metalbending!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow your roll there, Twinkle Toes. I might be the world’s greatest earthbender, but I need a little time to figure out this new skill by myself before I can teach it to someone else.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” Zuko declared. “Why don’t I teach you firebending?”

Aang froze, looking at him nervously. “O-Oh! Oh, um, that, that’s okay, really. I mean I don’t think I’m going to need firebending anyway since we’re going to invade the Fire Nation during the eclipse when there is no firebending right? So I better just focus on my earthbending for now. Although Toph is busy right now so I guess I can’t do that. Oh, but my waterbending could still use some work too! Great, I’m gonna go see Katara, bye now!” He hopped onto his air scooter and sped away.

Zuko watched him go, disappointed and apprehensive. He turned to his other friends. “What did I say?”

Sokka grimaced. “Aang’s got a weird thing about firebending. It’s nothing to do with you, so don’t worry about it. He’ll get over it.”

“What happened?” Zuko asked. “Maybe I can help him with whatever it is. I mean, no one here in Ba Sing Se knows more about firebending than I do.”

“It’s not that, Zuko.” Sokka hesitated. “Listen, someone tried to teach Aang firebending once, and it didn’t end well. He… accidentally burned Katara. It hit him hard. He hasn’t been able to think of firebending as anything but destructive ever since.”

Zuko looked down at his hands, guilt and regret tightening the muscles in his chest. “I can’t say he’s wrong.”

Jet rested a hand on his shoulder. “Zuko, we haven’t brought it up out of respect for your privacy, but… Katara told us about what happened with Longshot, and it wasn’t your fault.”

“Will you people quit saying that?” Zuko snapped, pulling away. “I burned him. How is that not my fault?”

“Uh, you were sleeping?” Sokka retorted.

“I should have had better control over my firebending.” Zuko shook his head. “You don’t understand. You aren’t firebenders.”

“Oh, really?” Smellerbee put her hands on her hips. “We don’t understand because we aren’t firebenders, or because we weren’t abused?”

Her final word seemed to echo in the area around them despite there being nothing for the sound to bounce off of. Zuko flinched violently, unfairly jarred by the word itself more than the implications. “I - what? What are you even talking about?”

“I’m talking about your father being an abusive piece of shit,” Smellerbee said slowly. Sokka and Jet looked at her in alarm.

“That isn’t – I wasn’t – “ The word caught in his throat, just inches away from escaping his lips. He couldn’t say it, even to deny it. He couldn’t think it, and his own uncontrollable, irrational reaction to it threw him off even more.

“Don’t even try to tell me you weren’t,” Smellerbee scoffed, oblivious. “What your father did to your face – that alone was abuse, forget about all my other suspicions.”

“That was not,” Zuko disagreed, latching onto the example the way a man who was drowning at sea might latch onto driftwood. “You’re forgetting that he disowned me before he scarred my face, so that couldn’t be child abuse, because I wasn’t his child anymore.” He exhaled, his presumed triumph flooding his body with relief, but then Sokka and Jet turned back to him as Smellerbee’s expression transformed to mimic their expressions. “What?” He took a step backwards.

“That’s not how abuse works,” Sokka protested, sounding genuinely confused. “Whether you were his kid or not, you were still a kid, and he hurt you, on purpose.”

“Besides that,” Smellerbee interjected, “it doesn’t matter if he disowned you or not. He was still responsible for you. He chose to have a kid and that means you’re his responsibility forever. There are no takebacks. So him hurting you after isn’t any different from him hurting you before. Especially since he was an authority figure even outside of being your father – “

“Smellerbee, stop,” Toph said urgently.

Smellerbee looked at her in disbelief. “You’re on his side?”

“Stop!” Toph shouted. “All of you, stop!” The three others turned to stare at her. Zuko felt exactly the same way he’d felt in the water outside of Avatar Roku’s temple right before Suki had saved him, only she wasn’t there, and he wasn’t drowning, and he didn’t know how to swim through his thunderous but intangible heartbeat and oxygen deprivation. Toph continued more calmly, “Yes, I’m on his side. This isn’t a fight. This isn’t ‘us versus Zuko.’ We should all be on his side.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Smellerbee scoffed. “I just meant that he was undeniably abused – “

Toph stepped close enough to grab Zuko’s hand and earthbended the ground beneath them into the air, effectively ending the conversation, and then for good measure she carried them through the air all the way back to his house. Still clutching his hand, she pulled him into his bedroom and slammed the new door closed. “Do you want a hug?” she demanded angrily.

Zuko blinked at her, his heartbeat slowing gradually as he sat down on his bed. Registering her words, he almost said ‘no,’ automatically, but then he thought about it for a few more moments and said, "Yeah." She stepped closer and hugged him almost violently, her arms pressed firmly against his upper arms and back as he rested his forehead on her shoulder. After a few seconds, he muttered, “It’s so stupid - “

“No, it’s not,” she disagreed fiercely, then seemed to realize he hadn’t finished. “…Wait, what is?”

“…It’s just…, the word.” She didn’t cut him off again, so he tentatively continued, “I know what the word means, and I know that it was – that I was – that it applied. I just don’t like the word itself. I don’t like hearing it and I don’t like thinking about it.”

“Well, I can tell that much,” Toph commented, arms tightening protectively around him. “Geez, your heart was going a mile a minute, I thought I was going to have a panic attack out of sympathy.”

“…You can feel my heartbeat?” Zuko pulled back to stare at her disbelievingly.

“Yep.” She grinned smugly at him. “I can feel your heartbeat, and – “ she pointedly raised her voice – “I can hear Aang’s heart going a mile a minute while he paces back and forth outside your door. Isn’t that interesting?”

A loud, familiar squeak rang through the house as Toph slammed the door open, revealing Aang standing right outside, bright red and fumbling awkwardly with his clothes. “H-H-Hi,” he stuttered. His gaze flicked back and forth between the two of them before finally landing on Toph. “Oh! Um, I was just wondering if you – if you’ve had any time to... to work on your metalbending?”

“Twinkle Toes, I just got home,” she sighed exasperatedly. “Is that really why you’re here?”

“Yep! Okay - I’m gonna go find Katara then - bye now!”

“Man, that kid is such a possum chicken,” Toph grumbled as he darted away. “You good, Zuko?”

“Sure,” Zuko said, not entirely sure what to make of that exchange.

“Cool. Come to think of it, I really should go practice my metalbending. Catch you later!” She bounded off.

Zuko headed for the tea shop, where Longshot, Katara, and Suki were running things. Katara was the one in the front taking orders. “Zuko!” she exclaimed in surprise. “You’re early! What happened to the war meeting?”

“General How had a visitor, so they sent us home early.” Zuko looked around. “Has Aang been by?” She shook her head. “That’s weird. He said he was going to go find you so you could practice waterbending, which is why I came – you know, to relieve you.”

Katara shrugged. “Maybe he decided to go practice on his own.”

“Maybe.” Zuko tilted his head. “Want me to take over?”

“That’s alright,” Katara dismissed. “You’ve been working non-stop for the past two weeks between the tea shop and the war plans.”

“No more than anyone else,” Zuko disagreed.

“Please, Zuko. I’ve seen the scrolls of notes that you review and add to every night.” She ruffled his hair affectionately. “Go have some fun, okay?”

“…Okay,” he agreed begrudgingly. He left the teashop and headed back to his house, wondering what he was supposed to do for fun in lieu of making tea. He found Sokka waiting outside. “Hey,” he said cautiously, remembering their argument earlier.

“Could I hug you?” Sokka asked hopefully.

That wasn’t what he’d expected. “…Um, okay.”

It was a very different hug from what Toph had given him. Where Toph’s hug had been fierce, Sokka’s was almost comforting. He pulled Zuko gently into his arms and put his left hand on Zuko’s back, his chin resting on Zuko’s left shoulder while his right hand reached up to run through Zuko’s hair a few times before settling. Zuko wasn’t sure what to do with his own hands, but when he eventually put them on Sokka’s back, it felt natural to rest his chin on Sokka’s shoulder too. He’d had an unprecedented number of hugs over the past two weeks, but he thought this was probably his favorite.

After a few minutes, Sokka pulled away just enough that his hands were grasping Zuko’s elbows. “I’m sorry about earlier.”

He looked so genuinely upset that Zuko couldn’t help but blurt out, “It’s okay, really. I overreacted.”

“Stop that.” Now Sokka looked even more upset. “We shouldn’t have pushed you. We were trying to help but we only made things worse. Smellerbee’s sorry too, but she wasn’t sure you’d want to see her, so she and Jet went out somewhere. Listen, after our mother died, I had a hard time talking to anyone about it. Once Gran-Gran got me to open up, I felt a bit better, and I guess I assumed that you would feel better too. But I forgot how hard it was to open up in the first place, and I forgot that those are two pretty different situations. Just know that anyone here would be more than happy to talk or to listen if you wanted them to, including me. You gotta know by now that you’re pretty important to all of us, not just Aang. Anyway, I’m sorry, and I don’t want you to apologize because you’ve got nothing to be sorry for, understand?”

“I understand.” Zuko didn’t understand, at least not entirely, but that seemed to be the thing to say because Sokka’s whole face brightened. “And… I… forgive you,” he added awkwardly. Sokka positively beamed at him.

“Can I hug you again?”

“Sokka, you can hug me whenever you like.”

“Oh-ho-ho, don’t let Katara or Aang hear you saying that,” Sokka sniggered. He gave Zuko a brief and much more enthusiastic hug before releasing him again and taking a step backwards. “So, what are you doing now?”

“I don’t know,” Zuko exclaimed frustratedly. Sokka took another step back, raising an eyebrow at him. “I haven’t had free time in years!”

“So…, isn’t that a good thing?” Sokka inquired warily. “I mean, not the not-having-it part, but having it now?”

“What am I supposed to do with it?” Zuko burst out.

Sokka smirked slowly. “That’s my favorite thing that you’ve ever said. Hang on – give me until tonight and I will have a whole list of things to do in your free time, alright? It’ll be so much fun! All of us can go around trying them together!”

“Uh, alright,” Zuko agreed tentatively.

Sokka ran off in the direction of his own house. As he passed by, Aang gave him a strange look, then continued towards Zuko. “What’s up with him?”

Zuko shrugged. “He’s Sokka.”

“Oh, true.” Aang took a deep breath, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. “Hey, so, um, I was thinking, what are you up to tonight?”

“Well, Sokka’s got some plan for us all to spend the night doing… something. He was pretty vague.”

“Oh.” Aang deflated for a few seconds, his head hanging, and then shot back up. “What are you doing right now?”

Zuko groaned. “I have no idea. Seriously, if you have any ideas, lay ‘em on me.”

Aang’s face broke into an earsplitting grin. “Well, I was wandering around yesterday after the tea shop closed down, and it turns out there’s a restaurant pretty close that serves a wide variety of food from all over the world. I was on my way there right now, actually. Wanna come with?”

“Sure,” Zuko agreed. “That sounds nice.”

If Aang’s grin widened any further, it was going to actually split his ears. “Great! Let’s go!” Aang turned around and started walking.

As he followed, Zuko realized something strange. “Wait, I thought you said you were on your way there?” Aang tripped over nothing, and Zuko lunged forward to catch his arm and stop his fall. “Are you okay?!”

“Yeah, fine,” Aang choked out, resuming his pace. “Uh, well – okay, the truth is I really… didn’t want to go alone.”

“Oh.” Zuko cocked his head to the side. “Do you want to see if Sokka and Toph want to come too, then?”

“No!” Aang hastily corrected. “I mean, no. I’d rather go just the two of us, if that’s okay.”

Zuko wasn’t sure why Aang would want to go with just him, but he couldn’t say he minded. “Of course.”

Aang’s shoulders sank as he relaxed a bit. “Okay. Great. So…, how do you like Ba Sing Se?”

“Well, since I’ve gotten here, all I’ve really done is make tea and plot my father’s demise, and those are my two favorite things.”

Aang laughed, but when Zuko failed to laugh with him, he stopped and gave him a funny look. “Oh, you weren’t kidding!”

“Why do people always think I’m kidding?” Zuko wondered.

“Well, no one can tell when you are and aren’t,” Aang explained. “So every time you say something funny, they assume you’re kidding. Try this!” He reached up and pinched the corners of Zuko’s lips before pulling. “Nope, now you just look like you’re pouting. Let me try again – “ With each of his index fingers, Aang poked his chin right below the corners of his lips and pushed up. The two of them stared at each other for a few seconds before Aang released him and burst into laughter. “Never mind! That was a terrible idea!”

“You think?” Zuko retorted, but the corners of his lips quirked upwards without Aang’s interference.

“Like that!” Aang exclaimed. “There! Just make that face when you’re kidding and people will stop assuming you are when you aren’t.”

“I’ll do that,” Zuko agreed warmly.

Aang pointed to something over Zuko’s shoulder. “Oh! There’s the restaurant!”

When they reached the building, a man in a strange amalgamation of colorful articles of clothing and accessories greeted them. Before he could say a word, he took in Aang’s appearance, and his jaw dropped. “My goodness!” the man gasped. He bowed swiftly. “My name is Fushur and it is my very great honor to meet you, Avatar Aang.”

“Oh!” Aang said, startled. He glanced quickly at Zuko. “Thank you, it’s good to meet you too – this is my friend – “

“Xin,” Zuko introduced himself, smiling.

“It is an honor to meet you too, Xin.” Fushur straightened out. “Are you here to try some of our exquisite cuisine? We happen to have several Air Nomad dishes on the menu – “

“Really?” Aang gasped. Zuko watched in fond amusement at the way Aang’s whole countenance shifted, growing exponentially brighter.

Fushur flushed. “W-Well, I can’t – I can’t guarantee authenticity, since no one’s ever met a real Air Nomad – but I can promise that we have extensively studied the cuisine and no one could possibly have replicated it better than we have here.”

“That’s so cool!” Aang exclaimed.

“Would you like me to seat you?” Fushur offered, seeming almost as excited as Aang by the prospect. Aang nodded vigorously, so Fushur led them to an open table and handed them a couple of menus.

“Potato curry…, vegetable dumplings…, cucumber mint soup!” Aang looked up at Zuko with a delighted grin. “They have cucumber mint soup, Zu- I mean, Xin!”

Zuko hummed indulgently. It was good to see Aang so carefree again, like he had been the first few times Zuko had met him and tried to kidnap him. He could almost imagine the weight of the world didn’t rest on Aang’s shoulders the rest of the time. “Come to think of it,” he mused, “they have dumplings in the Fire Nation, too…. Maybe not vegetable ones, though. Not a lot of vegetarians. Hey, look! Smoked sea slug! They’ve actually got some Fire Nation stuff here too.”

Aang made a face. “Sea slug?”

“Yes, sea slug. What, and cucumber mint soup is so much better?” A waiter came by, and they placed their orders. “You have your tastes, I have mine.”

Aang waved a pair of chopsticks at him threateningly. “I’m gonna make you try it.”

“Okay, that’s not fair at all,” Zuko protested. “You’re a vegetarian. You can’t try mine.”

“Sucks to be you, then, doesn’t it?”

As they walked home later that day, Aang asked Zuko, “How come you didn’t tell them your real name, anyway?”

“I’d rather not draw attention to myself,” Zuko admitted.

“I don’t get it.” Aang watched him quizzically. “King Kuei said it was okay for you to be here since you’re on our side and everything. Why don’t you want people to know who you are?”

“They wouldn’t understand. People think Fire Nation, they think ‘bad guys.’ That’s just how it is. That’s how it is everywhere. Except, of course, in the Fire Nation, where my name is probably synonymous with dishonorable now.”

“You’re different,” Aang insisted. “You’re a good guy. If I vouched for you, everyone would believe it.”

“I wouldn’t sully your name with mine.”

“What?!”

“Aang, you’re the Avatar,” Zuko said frustratedly. “And I’m the Fire Lord’s son. You don’t want to make our friendship too public.”

“But you’re not,” Aang countered. “You said it yourself. You’re not his son anymore. If we just showed everyone the wanted poster – “

“That’s much better. You’re friends with a wanted man.”

“But you’re wanted because you warned us about Zhao,” Aang exploded. “Because you’re a good guy!”

“That’s just not how people see it. It’s their gut reactions. They see Fire Nation, they think ‘evil.’ They see wanted, they think ‘evil.’ Putting the two together would be even worse. They would just be wondering what the Fire Lord’s own son did that was so awful he had to disown and banish him. What’s the big deal, anyway? Why is it so important to you that people know who I am?”

“Because they should.” Aang scowled at the ground. “They should know who saved them from Azula, who saved me from Zhao, and who saved Suki, Katara, and Sokka from those pirates. You deserve credit for these things, Zuko. I don’t know why you won’t accept it. I mean, you won’t even tell us how you got your scar but I already know that whatever it was, it made your father mad so it must have been a good thing, and you act like you’re – like you’re ashamed of it!”

“You have no idea how I got this,” Zuko snapped, reaching up to touch it with his left hand almost automatically. “And you don’t get to tell me how to feel about my scar.”

“Maybe not.” Aang took his hand, inadvertently brushing his fingertips along Zuko’s scar, and pulled it away from Zuko’s face cautiously as if waiting for resistance. When none came he lowered their hands but kept their fingers intertwined. “But I like it. It’s part of you, and I like you, so I like it, too. Doesn’t that mean anything?”

Zuko shrugged, blood rushing to his cheeks. “Of course it does. Your opinion means everything to me, Aang.”

“I feel them coming!” Toph’s voice shouted from a distance. Aang released his hand as if burned, and the two of them picked up the pace without looking at each other as they approached Aang’s house, where all of their friends were gathered outside. Smellerbee met his gaze nervously, but when he nodded and hesitantly smiled at her, she relaxed, smiling back. “Took your sweet old time,” Toph remarked.

Zuko glanced up at the sky. “It’s not even dark yet.”

Toph sighed exaggeratedly. “Yeah, well, Sokka decided it was time for ‘team bonding.’”

“Team bonding is important!” Sokka insisted. “We’re gonna be here for a while until the invasion, right? We might as well make the most of it! I’ve got a whole schedule planned out!” He pulled a scroll out of his bag and unrolled it, allowing it to flow from his hand all the way down to his feet.

“Sokka, no,” Katara said, horrified. “How long does that schedule go on for?”

“Until the invasion!”

“Sokka, no,” Suki echoed, shaking her head at him.

“This way we make the most out of our time here!” Sokka protested.

“I’m on his side,” Smellerbee declared. “If we have a schedule, we can make sure we get as much done as we can.”

“I don’t care about getting stuff done,” Toph retorted. “It’s supposed to be fun. How is it fun to live by a schedule?”

“Because with the schedule,” Sokka shook the scroll emphatically, “we do even more fun things!”

“It would have been nice if you’d consulted us before making that schedule,” Katara pointed out, peering at it. “I mean, a puppet show? Really, Sokka?”

“Sokka, could you get any lamer?” Toph complained.

“Hey, I think a puppet show could be fun!” Aang defended.

“How about we go find an underground fight club?” Jet suggested, cracking his knuckles as he grinned. “There’s gotta be one somewhere in Ba Sing Se, at least in the Lower Ring.”

“No thanks. I’ve had enough fighting for the past few months,” Katara rejected. “I’d rather go to a spa or something.”

“A spa?” Sokka wrinkled his nose. “You wanna go soak in some water? Isn’t that basically what you do when you fight, anyway?”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m just saying, puppet shows are something you’re not gonna find easily outside of Ba Sing Se.”

Longshot made his way to stand beside Sokka and patted his back supportively.

“I’ve never felt so betrayed,” Jet exclaimed.

“Longshot, what the heck?” Smellerbee added.

“I thought you liked the schedule, Smellerbee!” Sokka cried.

“Before I found out there was a puppet show on it!”

Although the words being spoken were harsh, it was easy to see and hear that the arguing was friendly and good-natured. Zuko smiled despite himself, something deep in his chest shifting and clicking into place as he watched the scene unfold. It felt good to be a part of something, for once. It felt good to look around and see so many people all in one place who he cared about, who cared about him, who he could trust and who trusted him right back.

Eventually, they settled on going to see a play, and later that night, Zuko prepared for bed while his other three housemates chatted about it. Halfway through brushing his teeth, his eyes flew wide open. He spat out the toothpaste early and wandered back to the living room without rinsing his mouth. “Was that a date?” he blurted out thoughtlessly. It was only at their startled expressions that he realized that he hadn’t even taken a second to think about the question himself before consulting them.

“Sit down,” Jet instructed, patting the seat next to him vigorously.

There was no way out of this conversation now. Zuko obediently sat beside Jet, squirming under the intense stares from all three of them.

“You’re talking about going to the restaurant earlier with Aang?”

Zuko nodded.

“Exactly how did he ask you?”

“Well, he came over here and asked me if I wanted to go with him to a restaurant – actually, he said he was on his way there, but then he led me back the way he came to get there – and then earlier, when Toph and I were in my room, he was pacing outside and Toph said something about his heart going really, really fast – she can feel it, with earthbending. He said he was there to speak with Toph but I don’t know how he could have known she was there. That doesn’t make any sense. None of this adds up.”

“It absolutely adds up!” Jet clapped him on the back, grinning madly. “Good for you! I mean, we could all tell you liked him. At least, the three of us could. I’ve never seen you smile at anyone that way – actually, I’ve never seen you smile at anyone – actually, I’ve never seen you smile.”

“He told me to smile more,” Zuko muttered, mostly to himself, as he leaned his elbows on his knees and rubbed his temples pensively. “He said he liked my scar. Because it was part of me.”

“Aw!” Zuko, Jet, and Longshot slowly looked up in shock at Smellerbee, who shrugged unashamedly. “What? I’m not allowed to be a girl sometimes?”

“What now?” Zuko asked them, drawing their attention back to him.

Jet frowned at him. “You do like him, right?”

“I do.”

“So go talk to him tomorrow and ask him on a real date! Explicitly!”

Zuko didn’t get the chance to talk to Aang the next morning. Someone came by with two pieces of mail; one for Sokka and Katara, and one for Zuko.

“I don’t believe it!” Katara exclaimed. “It’s an intelligence report – Sokka, our father is at Chameleon Bay!”

“You’re kidding!” Sokka yanked it out of her hands to scan it himself.

She put her hands on her hips. “I can read, Sokka.”

“I know, I know, I just – this is incredible!”

The two of them hugged each other. Zuko opened his own piece of mail, a letter.

Dear Zuko,

I hope this letter finds you in good health. You were always one of my favorite pupils, and I was saddened greatly by your banishment. I would have reached out sooner, but judging by the way you all but vanished after your mother’s tragic passing, it seemed you were actively attempting to stay under the radar, and I certainly wouldn’t have wanted to impede that. However, I heard recently that you united with the Avatar in Ba Sing Se. I want to commend you for finding your own place in the world beyond your father’s influence.

I would very much like to do so in-person, if such a thing could be arranged. I will be staying with two friends at the Eastern Air Temple for the foreseeable future, which is how I am confident this message will reach you before it is intercepted. If it is convenient, I implore you to visit.

Master Piandao

“It’s my old swordsmanship instructor,” Zuko exclaimed. “He’s at the Eastern Air Temple. He wants to see me!”

Chapter Text

'Cause I built a home for you, for me
Until it disappeared from me, from you
And now it's time to leave and turn to dust

To Build a Home by A Cinematic Orchestra

Act 2: The Teamaker

Chapter 12: Turn to Dust

“I can’t believe we’re splitting up,” Suki said sadly. “I mean, I’m so, so happy for you and Katara, and for you too, Zuko, and I know it has to be this way, but I wish it didn’t.”

“It’s just a week,” Sokka told her, wrapping an arm around her and pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “We’ll be back before you know it, okay?” Suki nodded silently, leaning into him. Aang was having a similar conversation with Appa outside the teashop, just a little less verbally. Katara sat between Zuko and Sokka, excitement bubbling over from every inch of her visage, and Toph was on Zuko’s other side, her head resting on the arm of the chair closer to him with her feet propped up on the other side. Jet and Smellerbee were whispering nearby, stealing glances at all of them when they thought no one was looking. As far as Zuko could tell, they’d been successful in not arousing suspicions so far; he seemed to be the lone exception, and he doubted any of the others had his levels of paranoia-induced hyperawareness.

The two whisperers finally ceased their whispering and joined the rest of the group. “Where’s Aang?” Jet asked.

“He’s outside. I’ll get him.” Toph headed outside. Zuko watched as she wordlessly and unceremoniously took Aang by the back of his shirt and dragging him into the closed teashop, leaving him to stumble backwards for fear of falling over. “Okay, got him. Go ahead, Jet.”

Uncharacteristically pink-faced, Jet held a bag out in front of him and pulled something out of it. It looked like a scarf, maybe, but very distinctly… handmade. It was pale green and deep navy blue, and there was writing embroidered onto the bottom, well-done but impossible to read from Zuko’s distance. He handed it to Suki, and then he pulled out a blue and white one to give to Sokka, and then a matching one for Katara. “Jet, did you make these?” Katara demanded, sounding impressed.

Jet’s back straightened at once as he shot her a cocky grin. “I did.”

“These look really, really good!”

“She’s right,” Zuko confirmed as he admired the black and forest green scarf in his own hands. At the bottom, the inscription read, Zuko – Team Avatar – Swordsman. He peered over Katara’s shoulder and saw that hers read, Katara – Team Avatar – Waterbender, and wasn’t quite sure what to think of Jet’s decision not to write Firebender on his, although he knew it was made with only the best of intentions. “When did you learn to knit?”

“My father taught me,” Jet admitted. “So you all like them?”

“I’m never taking mine off!” Aang declared, wrapping his pale yellow and bright orange scarf around his neck one, two, three, four times.

Toph felt around the scarf, her fingers pausing at the bottom. “Is that writing or some kind of symbol on this? Someone tell me what it is.”

Suki took it from her. “It's writing. It says, 'Toph, Team Avatar, Metalbender.'”

“Alright, I love the ‘metalbender’ touch, but did you really officially name us ‘Team Avatar?’”

“Yes!” Sokka punched the air triumphantly and high-fived Jet. “That’s what I’m talking about!”

Longshot walked out with a tray of cups of tea and began handing them out.

“One last cup for the road,” Sokka mused. He lifted his tea. “To Team Avatar!”

“I’m not toasting that,” Toph stated.

“To Team Avatar,” Zuko joined in. Jet, Suki, Smellerbee and Aang joined in too, followed by a reluctant Katara. “Come on, Toph. Just say it.”

“Team Avatar,” she grumbled.

Longshot lifted his cup, too. “Team Avatar.” Everyone stared at him in shock. He quirked an eyebrow in silent amusement.

As everyone around them started questioning Longshot to no avail, Aang walked over to Zuko, looking at the ground. “Could we talk for a second?”

“Sure,” Zuko said, ignoring his suddenly accelerated heartbeat and valiantly crushing the blood rushing to his head before it could reach his cheeks. He followed Aang to the empty back of the tea shop. “What is it?”

Aang set his cup to the side and met Zuko’s gaze. “You’re going to be careful, right?”

“Of course,” Zuko agreed, startled.

“You’re not going to do anything crazy, like - like sneak onto an admiral’s ship, or tackle your crazy sister, or jump into the ocean when you don’t know how to swim – “

“First of all, technically I know how to swim and have known for years. Second, Katara’s been teaching me to swim a little better in the pool nearby.” That obviously wasn’t the reaction Aang was hoping before, judging by the way his entire body drooped after he spoke. He had a funny feeling Aang wasn’t going to like what he said next, but it was true, so he said it anyway. “Third, all of those were the best plans I possibly could have come up with under the current situations.”

“No.” Aang shook his head fiercely. “You always act on impulse to keep us safe, and you never think about how to keep yourself safe. That’s what I’m asking you to do. Next time it’s you and someone you trust against someone like Azula, I don’t want you to just take one for the team, I want you to let them help.” His voice hardened. “And I want you to put your life before revenge or whatever it was that made you go after Zhao that night at the North Pole.”

“I – “

Aang cut him off, lightly jabbing him in the chest with his index finger. “And I already know you won’t do that for your own sake, for some reason, so now I’m asking you to do it for my sake. Please. I’ve lost everyone I ever knew. I can’t lose you. Promise me you’ll try to come back to me. Promise me you’ll put your own life on equal ground with everyone else’s lives. Stop sacrificing yourself. Come back.”

“I will,” Zuko promised. It was much easier to make than his last promise, despite them being virtually the same. This time, he had no desire to do anything else. “I’ll come back.”

Aang smiled at him, relieved. “Okay. Good. I know you can’t control what happens to you, but just knowing that you’re really going to do your best makes me feel better.”

“I will,” Zuko repeated, smiling back. Aang started to walk away back to their friends, but something made Zuko reach out and grasp Aang’s wrist, holding him back. It wasn’t the right time to talk about their date, not when they were about to be separated for a week. He knew that. Still, it didn’t feel right to leave without saying something to let Aang know that he wasn’t just another friend, that he was special to Zuko. “I was thirteen," he blurted out. "I was too young to go to a war meeting, but I convinced my uncle to let me go with him anyway. He told me not to speak or stand up, to just observe. One of the generals was telling everyone about his plan to distract a group of experienced Earth Kingdom soldiers with a group of new recruits. He wanted to use them as bait. I stood up and told him off. He challenged me to an Agni Kai, a fire duel, and I accepted.” Zuko grimaced. “What I didn’t realize was that he was challenging me as one of my father’s generals on behalf of my father. At the Agni Kai, it was my father waiting for me. He told me to fight, and I should have. It wasn’t like he’d never hurt me before. Still, I didn’t fight him. So he scarred my face to give me and anyone who looked at me a permanent reminder of my weakness.”

“Oh, Zuko.” Aang pulled his wrist out of Zuko’s hand to take the hand between both of his. “Zuko, that isn’t weakness. That’s strength. As little as he deserved it, you loved your father. You refused to hurt him even though he hurt you. That is the most incredible kind of strength.” He reached out, slowly enough that Zuko had time to move away if he so desired, and gently placed his palm against the scar. Zuko’s left eye closed at once from the contact, and out of instinct his right eye followed swiftly. “This scar,” Aang told him in a hushed voice, much closer than he had been a few seconds ago, “is not weakness. It’s strength. I hope you always see your reflection and remember that, Zuko.” His hand fell away from Zuko’s cheek, but the warmth was soon replaced by warm breath on his cheek, and before Zuko could register the new sensation, Aang placed a quick kiss on his cheek.

Zuko opened his eyes immediately, stunned, but Aang was already gone, the door to the front of the teashop sliding shut as he turned to look. Typical airbender, Toph’s voice remarked in his head, and he pressed a fist against his lips to stifle an abrupt and very out-of-place snicker. That was as close to proof of Aang’s feelings as he possibly could have hoped for, just one step below an outright confession in terms of concreteness. Even he couldn’t possibly misinterpret that. He took a second to compose himself and then he followed Aang back into the main tea shop. Aang wasn’t there anymore, though that was to be expected. “Sokka and Katara are outside on Appa,” Jet informed him. He gave Zuko a pointed look.

“Your heart’s going pretty fast there, Zuko,” Toph commented, somehow both nonchalant and smug at the same time. “Wonder what that’s about.”

Zuko didn’t stand a chance of fighting his blush that time. Before he could respond, Suki rose with an amused, “Give the poor boy a break, Toph,” and crossed the room in a couple quick strides. “Come back,” she told him firmly, putting her arms around his neck to give him a quick, tight hug. “You hear me?”

Toph got up too to punch him in the arm more gently than she used to. “I like you, and I don’t like a lot of people, so you better do whatever it takes to get back here.”

“I’m visiting a friend, not going off to war,” Zuko teased, punching her back.

Smellerbee gasped. “Did Blueko just make a joke?”

“Someone tell the Earth King,” Jet declared mock-urgently. “We’ve got an imposter.”

“You’re hilarious,” Zuko told them. “Really. Absolutely hysterical.”

“We know,” Jet assured him. He, Smellerbee, and Longshot then proceeded to tackle him in a particularly enthusiastic group hug.

When they pulled away, Longshot scowled suspiciously at him and looked pointedly at Toph and Suki.

“Yes, I promise I’ll come back,” Zuko sighed. He didn’t know how he had ended up making that promise to so many people. It felt like an awful lot of responsibility, having so many people whose happiness depended on his survival. “As long as I don’t have to kill or permanently maim anyone to do so.”

“Maiming is fine,” Jet told him. Suki, Smellerbee, and Longshot nodded emphatically while Toph voiced her approval.

“Okay, I will maim people to get home. But no murder.”

“I guess that’s good enough,” Suki conceded evenly.

Zuko left the teashop and joined Sokka in Appa’s saddle. Katara glanced over her shoulder at him, looking vaguely disappointed. “Just you?” she said.

Zuko knew better than to take offense from a comment by Katara, but the comment still confused him. “Meaning?”

“Oh! Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that!”

“I figured.”

“I just meant – I didn’t mean anything! Nope. Not anything at all.” The hopeful glances she sent every which way thoroughly belied her dismissal. Between that and Sokka’s not-so-inconspicuous peering at the teashop, Zuko felt very much like he was missing something.

The tea shop door flew open hard enough that Zuko feared for his safety. A yellow-and-orange blur sped through the doorway and Aang materialized before them. “Can I come?” he blurted out.

Zuko heard twin sighs of relief behind him and stored them away for later analysis. “He’s your bison,” he pointed out amusedly. “We can hardly stop you.”

Sokka slung an arm around Zuko’s neck and added loudly, “What Zuko here means is that we would love to have you join us.”

Zuko shrugged. “It was implied.”

“No, it wasn’t.”

“It was.”

“It really wasn’t,” Katara called from Appa’s head.

“We would love to have you join us,” Zuko parroted at Aang. He turned back to Sokka. “Was that explicit enough for you?”

“You could be a little nicer about it,” Katara put in.

Zuko turned back to Aang. “Avatar Aang, it would be my utmost, immeasurable honor to host you on your own bison while I travel to a temple belonging to your people. Truly, there are no words to describe the sheer joy I experience just from imagining it. I can’t possibly begin – “

“Okay, okay, enough!” Sokka lightly shoved Zuko and scooted away. “Just get in, Aang, before he runs out of fancy words.”

Aang laughed and hopped onto Appa’s head to replace Katara, who settled in the saddle with Zuko and Sokka. As they flew away from Ba Sing Se, Sokka and Katara started bickering about something. Zuko leaned against the edge of Appa’s saddle closest to Aang. The other two weren’t looking or listening, but on the off-chance one of them tuned in however briefly, he didn’t want to say anything incriminating before he and Aang had had a chance to speak in private. Instead, he said softly, "Hey." Aang glanced over his shoulder, and Zuko tried to communicate his thoughts solely through the absolute widest smile he was capable of giving.

“Hey,” Aang responded, pink-faced and smiling back.

Zuko didn’t realize how long they’d been smiling until Sokka complained, “Are we really going to spend the whole ride watching you two make faces at each other? Really?”

Within a day, they settled down on Chameleon Bay near some Southern Water Tribe ships. “Guys, wait,” Aang said to Sokka and Katara before they left Appa. He turned to Zuko. “Are you going to use your real name, or Xin?”

“Why wouldn’t he use his real name?” Sokka asked in confusion, resting his chin on Zuko’s left shoulder from behind as he threw his arm over Zuko’s right shoulder.

“I wasn’t planning on using any name,” Zuko muttered, wondering when Sokka had gotten so clingy. He wondered if Sokka had taken his open invitation for hugs to mean he wanted more of them. He couldn’t say he minded. Sokka gave very good hugs. He was sort of like a living blanket. “I was just gonna stay here until Aang got back.”

“But don’t you want to meet our father?” Katara objected.

Zuko squirmed uncomfortably under her questioning gaze. “Do you want me to?”

“…Yes?”

Zuko glanced helplessly at Aang, who grinned at him. “…Okay. What name do you two want me to use?”

“…Zuko?” Katara was giving him a very strange look.

“Okay, then that’s what I’ll do.”

“Great, then let’s go!” Sokka cheered. He released Zuko and threw himself out of the saddle, Katara hot on his heels. Zuko and Aang followed just a little more sedately and kept behind the other two. As they reached the camp, men started to look up, their faces briefly showing alarm before breaking into delighted recognition. Sokka’s and Katara’s names traveled through the camp in hushed, awed whispers until one man approached them and pulled them into a tight hug. “It’s so good to see you two again,” he told them with a warm smile. “You too, Aang – and who’s this?”

“This is our friend Zuko,” Katara explained. Zuko was relieved when Bato’s expression didn’t falter – evidently he didn’t recognize the name. Unfortunately, Zuko’s relief was short-lived. “He was the Fire Lord’s son, but he was banished three years ago and he’s on our side now.”

“He taught me how to use a sword,” Sokka chirped.

Bato considered Zuko carefully. He seemed quite calm in the face of Katara’s revelation, so Zuko decided it would be safe to put his two copper in. “Sir, the Fire Lord gave me this scar. My loyalty is towards my friends now – Aang, Sokka, and Katara, and our other friends back home.”

Bato’s face softened substantially. (In hindsight, perhaps the scar on Zuko’s face was the best thing his father could have given him as a parting gift. Nothing had ever endeared him to someone faster than his scar’s origin.) “Well, it’s good to meet you, Zuko. Er, Prince Zuko?”

“Just Zuko,” Zuko corrected. “It’s good to meet you too.”

Bato led them to the tent where Hakoda was. Zuko and Aang let the three Water Tribe members go in without them. A few minutes later, they reappeared with another Water Tribe member. “It’s a pleasure to meet you both, Avatar Aang, Zuko,” Hakoda greeted them.

“You too, Chief Hakoda. Sokka and Katara have told us so much about you,” Aang replied cheerfully.

The six of them chatted for a short while longer before Zuko and Aang said their goodbyes and headed back to Appa. Zuko pulled a map out of his bag and looked at it pensively. “Would you…” He looked back up at Aang. “Would you mind if we took a detour? A long detour. About a day from here and then another day from the temple.”

“It’s up to you,” Aang told him.

Zuko nodded. “Okay. Then, if you don’t mind,” he pointed close to the bottom of the map, “I’d like to stop here.”

A day later, they landed in a small Earth Kingdom village.

“Is that…?”

“It’s the Avatar!”

“The Avatar? What is the Avatar doing here?”

Zuko slid off of Appa’s back, and the whispers changed to excited shouts.

“It’s Xin!”

“Xin? No way!”

“He came back!”

Zuko laughed as four kids tackled him all at once. “Baomu, Ishen, Holi, Bonoh,” he greeted them, ruffling their hair as efficiently as he could with only two hands.

Bonoh latched onto his hand and tugged him away from the other kids. “Come on, let’s go tell Lee! He’ll be so excited to see you!” Zuko quickly took Aang’s hand too. Bonoh led them away from the center of the village down a familiar path at the end of which sat a very, very familiar house.

Before they reached the door, the door burst open. Sela ran forward and yanked Zuko into her arms, holding him so tightly he couldn’t move his own arms to hug her back, although he managed to at least maintain his grip on Aang’s hand. “It’s so good to see you again,” Zuko told her, smiling into her shoulder despite the vaguely uncomfortable position.

“Xin!” Sela released him as Lee came running out of the house. Zuko caught him and finally let go of Aang so he could lift Lee into the air and give him a proper hug. Lee latched onto his neck. “You came back,” he whispered disbelievingly. “I thought that crazy lady was gonna kill you!”

Zuko very, very nearly pointed out that Azula would sooner torture him into insanity than kill him, but it occurred to him at the last second that maybe that wasn’t appropriate to say to someone so young. Instead he said, “I’m not that easy to kill.”

Lee pulled back, tears forming in his eyes. Zuko’s gaze sharpened. Something was wrong. He glanced back and forth between Lee and Sela as he set the former down. “What happened?”

Sela grimaced. “Let’s talk inside.” She led them inside, but paused in the doorway, glancing down between Zuko and Aang where their hands had already reunited, then back up at him with a sly smirk. “Xin, you didn’t tell me the Avatar was your boyfriend.”

“The Avatar wasn’t my boyfriend,” Zuko grouched, and nearly tripped when the unintentional implications of what he’d said caught up with him. Well. If he’d somehow miscalculated, that was going to be pretty awkward. Aang squeezed his hand reassuringly, so he thought he was probably okay.

Sela led them to the table. “Xin, would you help me make some tea?”

“Of course.” Zuko left Aang and Lee and followed her into the kitchen. “Where’s Gansu?” he asked apprehensively.

Sela bit her lip as she scooped some water into a pot. “My other son, Sensu, went missing,” she replied quietly. “Gansu went to find him. That was weeks ago.”

Zuko gently grasped her wrist, stopping her in her actions. He rested a hand on her shoulder and tugged so that she was facing him. Then he pulled her into a careful hug not unlike the one Sokka had given him a few days ago. “Sela, I’m so sorry.”

Sela pressed her face into his shoulder for a few moments, then pulled away to smile at him. “How are you doing, Xin?” She gingerly brushed her fingers against his left wrist, tilting her head at him. “Are you okay?”

“I’m great,” Zuko promised. “Really, really great.”

Sela raised an eyebrow knowingly at him. “Hmm. I wonder if that’s anything to do with the Avatar playing Four Nations with my youngest son in the living room.”

“It is,” Zuko admitted. “But it’s not just him. I’ve got friends now, too, a whole group of people who really, genuinely care about me.” Maybe he was reading too much into the wording, but something deep inside him clenched and twisted at her referral to Lee as her 'youngest' son instead of her 'younger' son.

Sela patted his right cheek affectionately. “I’m so happy to hear that, Xin.” She poured the tea into four cups, and Zuko realized belatedly that he hadn’t actually helped at all. The two of them went back into the living room and Zuko sat between Aang and Lee while Sela served the tea and sat down opposite him.

“Xin, why didn’t you tell us you were a prince?” Lee demanded excitedly. “And why didn’t you tell us your real name was Zuko?”

Zuko glanced at Sela in surprise. She sighed. “I tried to keep the poster from him, but when he found out there was something about you we were keeping from him, well, he made it his business to find out.”

Zuko turned back to Lee. “If you saw the poster, you know I’m wanted. You know I’m from the Fire Nation.”

“Yeah.”

“If I told you who I was,” Zuko explained, choosing his words carefully, “all three of you would have been legally required to tell the authorities. And I trust you! Of course I do. But if you knew who I was, and you chose not to tell anyone, then when Azula, my sister, that crazy lady, came looking for me, she would have been really, really mad at you guys. She probably would have thrown both of your parents in jail.”

“So you were protecting us?” Lee beamed at him. “You’re so brave, Xin. Er, Zuko. What do people usually call me?”

Zuko ruffled his hair. “Zuko,” he answered.

“Can I call you Prince Zuko?”

“No!”

Zuko and Aang ended up spending the night there, with Zuko sharing Lee’s room and Aang taking his old one. They left bright and early the next morning before anyone was likely to come investigate claims of Zuko’s reappearance, on the off-chance that one of the villagers reported them. Sela and Lee walked them to Appa, who had settled right outside their house for the night. Zuko knelt in front of Lee and pulled his knife out of his bag. “My uncle gave me this when I was ten,” he told him quietly, looking at him seriously. “I want you to have it.”

Wide-eyed, Lee took the knife from him and pulled it from its sheath. “’Never give up without a fight,’” he read. He gingerly sheathed it again and threw his arms around Zuko’s neck. “Promise you’ll come back,” he mumbled into Zuko’s shoulder. “Promise me.”

“Shh. I promise. I’ll come back, Lee.”

Sela was next, hugging him just as tightly as she had the day before. She turned to Aang next. “It was good to meet you, Aang.”

“You too,” he answered. “I’ll keep Zuko safe for you. I’ll bring him back to you.”

Sela hugged him too, and then they two of them boarded Appa. “Yip yip!” Aang said. As soon as they were out of the village, Aang asked, “How did you meet those two?” The question burst from him like he’d been holding it in the whole time. “And how do all those villagers know you so well? I mean, you’re a super likeable person! But you’re usually pretty anti-social. You must have been here a long time!”

“Three weeks,” Zuko replied. “Sela and her husband, Gansu, saved my life, and then they insisted I stay with them while I healed, so I started teaching villagers to swordfight for money so I could repay them.” He came so close to telling Aang the whole story about how they’d saved him, but as his fingers pressed against a thin white line on his left wrist, he decided that some things were better kept secret.

“I am going to bring you back to them,” Aang told him, meeting his eyes. “I am.”

“I believe you,” Zuko assured him, and he meant it. “I’m going to bring you back, too.”

Aang laughed. “Of course. I still want to meet Sensu and Gansu. What are they like?”

“Gansu is great. He’s very protective of his family, which makes him seem a bit intimidating, but he’s really very kind and very supportive. I’ve… never actually met Sensu,” Zuko admitted. “I have no idea what he’s like.” He clasped his hands on his lap and rubbed his thumbs together pensively.

As if reading his mind, Aang turned around and, keeping his left hand on the reins, placed his right hand comfortingly on Zuko’s knee. “I’m sure he’ll like you. I can’t imagine anyone not liking you!”

“Azula,” Zuko commented off-handedly. “My father. Zhao…. June.”

“June,” Aang echoed in disgust. “I hope we never see her again.”

“Yeah, you and me both,” Zuko snorted. “You know what? There’s a Fire Nation intern named Terong who probably doesn’t like me much. He’s probably not an intern anymore, come to think of it, which is my fault, which is why he probably doesn’t like me.” Aang laughed, so Zuko kept going. “Those Fire Sages from Avatar Roku’s temple - I bet they’re not too fond of me. Oh!”

“’Oh’ what?”

“No, Oh. That’s his name. He’s one of the pirates who tried to kill Suki, Sokka, and Katara, and tried to kidnap you. I bet none of them like me. Jet, Smellerbee, and I broke into New Ozai in disguise and held the governor there hostage until they told me where an associate of mine went. He wouldn’t like me anymore if he knew it was me. The four soldiers and the general that we beat up to take their money and uniforms don’t like me. General Bujing, that guy who challenged me to an Agni Kai before I was banished, definitely doesn’t like me. There’s a guy in jail in Chin Village named Hao who I put in jail back when I was the Blue Spirit. He doesn’t like me.”

“But Zuko, all of those guys are bad guys – wait, Chin Village?” Aang wrinkled his nose. “How sure are you that that guy was a criminal?”

“He killed two people.”

“Did he kill two people, or did his past life kill two people?”

“No, Aang, he killed two people.”

“Just making sure.”

Perhaps alerted to their incoming arrival by Appa’s roars, Piandao was waiting for them outside of the Eastern Air Temple when they landed. “Prince Zuko,” Piandao greeted him warmly. “I am so pleased to see you in good health after all these years.”

Zuko leapt from Appa. “You too, Master Piandao.” He patted his sheath regretfully. “I fought with your swords until very recently. One of them was lost to me in the North Pole, and I passed the other on to a friend of mine who I took on as a student when one of Ba Sing Se’s generals graciously replaced them with a new set of dao blades.”

“Ah, well. If you had to lose them, at least you lost them both nobly.” Piandao smiled broadly. “I see you brought the Avatar with you!”

“Hello, Master Piandao.” Aang bowed. “I’m Aang. It’s nice to finally meet Zuko’s swordsmanship instructor.”

“It’s nice to meet you too, Aang.” Piandao stepped back to face them both. “Incidentally, I have two friends inside, one of whom has been waiting a very long time to meet you, Aang. His name is Guru Pathik. We were hoping you would be here dropping Zuko off with your flying bison. He wishes to teach you how to control the Avatar State.”

Aang’s jaw dropped. “Seriously?”

“I have an old friend who would like to see you too, Zuko. I’d tell you his name, but, well, I think it’d be better for you to reunite with him face-to-face.” He led them inside the temple.

Zuko froze as soon as he laid eyes on one of the two men inside. “…Uncle…?”

“Zuko,” Iroh replied warmly, tears shining in his eyes.

Zuko launched himself at Iroh, clutching his uncle more tightly than he’d ever held onto anything. Iroh’s arms came around his back to pull him even closer as he buried his face in Iroh’s shoulder. “How are you alive?” he mumbled hoarsely, squeezing his eyes shut as they moistened with tears. “I thought – I thought my father – I knew you didn’t kill yourself, but I thought he - “

“I was looking for you,” Iroh murmured. He felt Iroh smiling into his hair. “You’re not as easy to find as I expected.”

“I was the Blue Spirit,” Zuko explained, reeling.

Iroh barked out a laugh. “I see we have much to catch up on!” Zuko reluctantly released him, but Iroh didn’t let him get too far, keeping his hands on Zuko’s upper arms. He frowned, moving his left hand to gingerly caress his scar. He glanced past Zuko at Aang and smirked. “You know, I don’t think that’s what your father meant when he told you to find the Avatar.”

Laughter bubbled up in Zuko’s chest and forced its way out, causing him to pull away further and double over. “No, probably not,” he agreed. “So you’re, what, you’re neutral now? In the war? Or….”

“How much do you know about the Order of the White Lotus?” Iroh asked in response.

Zuko and Aang exchanged glances. “Nothing,” Zuko told him.

“When Lu Ten died,” Iroh began, “I traveled to the spirit world in search of him. Obviously I was unsuccessful, but while there, I was shown the error of my ways. That is the true reason for my retirement. When I ended the siege of Ba Sing Se, I found the Order of the White Lotus, an organization that transcends national boundaries. Now I spend my days assisting rebels throughout the Earth Kingdom. Zuko, Avatar Aang, you both have my full support in your mission to dethrone my brother.” Zuko released a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.

The fifth person in the room finally stepped forward. “Avatar Aang, I am Guru Pathik. I was a spiritual brother of your people and a personal friend of Monk Gyatso, and I can teach you to gain control of the Avatar State.”

“How?” Aang asked breathlessly, looking excited.

“You must gain balance within yourself before you can bring balance to the world.” Guru Pathik waved Aang towards him and gestured deeper into the temple. “Come with me, and I will teach you everything you need to know and guide you towards balance.”

Aang glanced worriedly at Zuko. “Go,” Zuko encouraged him. Aang nodded and followed Guru Pathik away from them.

“So, you were the Blue Spirit?” Piandao inquired, obviously intrigued. “How did that happen?”

The three of them headed into the air temple with Appa padding after them and settled in a cooler part of the temple with a flowing spring nearby. They sat down as Zuko began, “When I witnessed my mother's murder, I dedicated myself to getting revenge on the killer. I ended up adopting the Blue Spirit persona along the way - a fellow firebender named Chit Sang advised me on how to get my bearings as a bounty hunter. I chased the killer all the way across the Earth Kingdom, and when I finally caught up to him on Kyoshi Island, I discovered he was hired by Admiral Zhao. Since then, I've mostly stuck to my work as a bounty hunter, although as you can see I've joined forces with the Avatar now.” Zuko leaned forward. “Your turn, Uncle.”

Iroh sighed. “My story starts at the same time. When I heard that your mother had died, I, too, realized the danger that you might be in, not just from the Fire Nation but from being all alone at such a young age. It took about half a year to make the arrangements, but with the White Lotus’s help, I was able to fake my suicide, allowing me to look for you without fear of endangering you or being assassinated myself much the same way your mother was. I must admit that I feared the worst when I couldn’t find you, but I consoled myself with the knowledge that if something had happened to you, the news would surely travel far enough to reach me no matter where I was. I began to focus on supporting the Earth Kingdom as quietly as I could while I searched for you. Until recently, I hadn’t ever expected to find you.” Iroh reached forward and gripped his shoulder, smiling as tears built up in his eyes again. “I was so relieved to hear not only that you were alive and well, but that you had found your way to the right side of the war since your banishment. Despite your father’s influence, you have grown up to be your own person, a very remarkable young man who I am proud to call my nephew.”

The two of them exchanged stories while Piandao listened in for quite a few hours. Eventually, Iroh said, “Nephew, if you intend to face your sister again, I wish to teach you more advanced firebending.”

Zuko stared at him hopefully. “Such as?”

“I’ve heard that Princess Azula has learned to bend lightning since I left the Fire Nation. As it so happens, I, too, possess this ability, and I am more than happy to pass it on to you.” The two of them stepped outside of the temple while Piandao trailed behind them, a silent observer. “Lightning is a pure form of firebending, without aggression. It is not fueled by rage or emotion the way other firebending is. Some call lightning the cold-blooded fire. It is precise and deadly. To perform the technique requires peace of mind.”

“Should we drink some tea first, then?”

Iroh stared at him like he’d never seen him before. He looked like he might start crying again. “That is an excellent suggestion, Nephew,” he rasped.

“I brought some supplies with me,” Zuko revealed, getting his bag from Appa’s saddle. “Would you like ginseng? I know it was your favorite – “

Iroh cut him off by hugging him much more enthusiastically than the first time. Zuko nearly dropped the bag, but was luckily able to set it down gently so the teapot and teacups within wouldn’t be damaged before he returned the hug with an equal amount of enthusiasm. “I am so lucky to have a nephew like you,” Iroh told him.

Zuko set up the tea, and as it steeped, he told Iroh and Piandao, “I run a teashop in Ba Sing Se with the rest of our friends.”

“Tell me more about your friends,” Iroh invited. “How did you meet them all? How did you end up helping the Avatar?”

Zuko launched into a summary of the trials he'd undergone since discovering the Avatar's return, highlighting first the meeting on Kyoshi Island, then the reunion with Zhao near the Pohuai Stronghold, then the discovery of Appa, and finally the arrival in the Earth Kingdom. Only briefly did he address the events from infiltrating Zhao's ship to rescuing the Freedom Fighters, discomforted by the memory of the suicide attempts and the self-destructive missions that had bookended it. Piandao was quiet throughout, seemingly content to act as a silent observer and give him and Iroh their time together.

As he poured the tea for the three of them, he went on, "Sokka discovered a recurring phenomenon called the Day of Black Sun, a total solar eclipse that takes away all firebending, and it's going to be here at the beginning of summer. Now we're working with the Earth King and his generals to plan an invasion of the Fire Nation."

“An invasion?” Iroh echoed, sipping his tea with an appreciative nod. “Truly?” He frowned. "I'm sorry to say it, but... you know what that will mean for your father, Zuko. Are you prepared?"

"I am," Zuko replied confidently, squashing any instinctive hesitation within him. "I'm not... ecstatic about it, but it's the right thing, and it's a fate he's chosen over and over again since he became Fire Lord. I'm prepared."

Iroh nodded again, satisfied. "Good. You won't be alone that day, nephew. I'll be there with you, both to help and to support you."

"I'd be more than happy to join you on that day as well," Piandao declared. “As a matter of fact, I will inform the rest of the White Lotus at once. I’m sure the Order will lend any assistance they can.”

Zuko’s jaw dropped. “That… That would be incredible!”

“We’ll have to get Bumi from New Ozai,” Piandao mused to Iroh. “He won’t miss a chance to help defeat the Fire Nation.” He rose to his feet and declared, “I’ll go get my messenger hawk and send letters to the other Grand Masters.” He walked off with his tea.

Iroh set his teacup down. “Are you ready to bend lightning?”

“Yes, Uncle.” Zuko set his cup down too.

As they got up, Iroh said, “There is energy all around us. The energy is both yin and yang, positive energy and negative energy. Only a select few firebenders can separate these energies. This creates an imbalance. The energy wants to restore balance, and in the moment the positive and negative energy come crashing back together, you provide release and guidance, creating lightning.” Lightning crackled across his arms and fingers, and he pointed to the sky, letting it tear from him through the clouds.

Zuko watched in awe. “Okay. I’m ready to try it.”

“Remember, once you separate the energy, you do not command it,” Iroh cautioned him. “You are simply its humble guide. Now, breathe first.”

Zuko took a deep breath. He searched within himself for the negative and positive energies Iroh had spoken of, extricated them from each other, and mimicked Iroh’s movements. A huge explosion sent him flying backwards. The ground slammed into his back, and he reeled from the impact.

“Nephew! Are you alright?” Iroh rushed over and helped him back to his feet.

“I’m fine,” Zuko grunted. He took another breath. “I’m fine,” he repeated more calmly. “Let me try again.”

“Be careful,” Iroh warned. “I don’t think you separated them properly.”

Zuko got back into position. This time he visualized the spirit oasis from the North Pole, the Ocean Spirit and Moon Spirit circling each other in an eternal dance. The energy is both yin and yang…, positive energy and negative energy…. He pictured a line being drawn in the water between, spinning as they circled, the motion pushing and pulling the line in either direction. He reached out towards it in his mind and gently tugged them apart. Gradually, he felt the resistance from the positive and negative energies. As it built up, he prepared himself to guide it, and then he set the energies free, letting them snap back to each other –

Zuko positioned himself between Zhao and Katara and snarled, “Don’t touch her – don’t touch any of them!”

“He killed the Moon Spirit!” Zuko shouted at Suki, incensed. “He killed my mother! He stabbed her in the chest, he twisted, and he left her there in that alley to bleed to death!”

”Here you have it, soldiers,” Zhao sneered. “The banished prince, a proven traitor. The Fire Lord will be pleased with us, men.”

Zuko came to on the ground once more, electricity still crackling on his skin as Iroh knelt beside him, looking alarmed. “You separated the energies, but once they reconnected, your emotions took over,” Iroh explained. “Are you okay?”

Zuko nearly answered with another, “I’m fine,” instinctively, but instead he took a second to test out his muscles, revealing just a bit of soreness, not enough to be debilitating. “Good enough,” he decided. “I can try again, at least one more time.”

“Are you sure? You shouldn’t push yourself too far!”

“I know my limits, Uncle,” Zuko reassured him. “At least once more.”

Iroh backed away, and Zuko took a few seconds to breathe deeply, focusing on the passage of air in and out of his lungs. He hated to think about some of his more painful memories, but perhaps it was time to examine them more closely. He recalled the memories that the lightning had brought to the forefront, recalled the events that followed: washing up on that driftwood, Azula’s attempt to capture him, putting his sword to his skin. Though it had been so many weeks since then, the scar remained on the inside of his left wrist, fading infinitesimally every day. He traced the line and closed his eyes, imagining the sensation of cloth pressed against his aching wrist, hearing Sela’s voice asking how he was feeling. Somewhere deep in the back of his mind, he still felt the dull surrealism of finding himself still breathing the next day and going through the motions of impersonating a living human being. He tapped into the keen sense of detachment and allowed it to flow through his veins once more, numbing him. A strange tranquility settling over him, he felt for the energies once more, separating them with more ease now, and familiarized himself with each side as they fought to reach each other. Finally, he let them slam into each other. The impact sent lightning through his body to his skin. He carried it in his arms as he pointed two fingers at the sky, and the energy shot from his fingertips and ripped through the clouds in its path. He bent over, laughing with relief. “I did it!” he cried joyfully. He looked up at Iroh, who was beaming at him. “Uncle, I did it!”

“So you did,” Iroh mused, warmth shining in his eyes.

“I… I think I better take a break now,” Zuko decided. He didn’t like the emptiness that pervaded his body now. It felt far too similar to the despair he’d spent weeks fighting off after the North Pole and had only recently defeated.

“Good idea,” Iroh approved. “In the meantime, I have another technique to show you. It is a firebending trick that even Azula doesn’t know, because I made it up myself.” They sat down next to the spring. Iroh picked up a stick and began drawing symbols in the sand, prefacing with a detailed explanation of fundamental virtues in each nation. From there, he went on to explain the origins of his trick, concluding with, "A waterbender lets their defense become their offense, turning their opponents’ energy against them. I learned a way to do this with lightning.”

Zuko’s jaw dropped as they got to their feet once more. “You can teach me to redirect lightning?”

Iroh elaborated on the execution of the technique, clarifying the purpose behind each motion as he demonstrated. Zuko followed along closely, mimicking each action. “Now, are you focusing your energy? Can you feel your own chi flowing in, down, up, and out?”

Zuko nodded as he repeated the routine several times. “Yes, I think so.” The two of them practiced for a few minutes. Eventually Zuko felt ready to return to the lightning, and he told his uncle as much. “Let me wash my face first, though,” he decided, wiping sweat from his forehead. He knelt beside the spring and scooped some water out with his hands.

“Let me go! You’ll pay for this!”

“I highly doubt it. The only person paying for this will be the Avatar and my brother.”

“Even when they come, you’ll never catch them. You can’t take all of us!”

“With the Dai Li on my side, I certainly can.”

“-uko. Zuko!”

Zuko jerked his head away from the water to meet Iroh’s concerned gaze. “The Ocean Spirit,” he gasped, “it saved my life in the North Pole, it healed my wounds and carried me away from the battle to safety, it gave me a vision once of Aang and now it’s just given me a vision of Suki and Jet – and Azula – Azula’s in Ba Sing Se!”

Iroh’s eyes narrowed. “Then you must return at once.”

Zuko accepted the proffered hand and pulled himself to his feet. “Uncle, will you come?”

Iroh shook his head. “I wish I could, but I cannot return to Ba Sing Se. Go save your friends. I will see you again soon, I am sure of it.”

Zuko hugged Iroh again, this time as a goodbye. Then he packed his bag up again and ran in the direction Aang and Guru Pathik had taken. He skidded to a halt at the entrance to a cave, within which they were meditating. “Aang,” he called. “Aang, we have to go.”

Aang turned to him, round-eyed. The guru regarded Aang with trepidation. “Why? What happened?”

“The Ocean Spirit sent me another vision. Azula’s in Ba Sing Se, and she has Suki and Jet in some sort of cave.”

Aang turned back to the guru. “I have to go.”

“No, Aang,” Guru Pathik insisted desperately. “By choosing attachment, you have locked the chakra! If you leave now, you won’t be able to go into the Avatar State at all!”

Aang glanced desperately back and forth between the guru and Zuko, who was utterly bemused. Finally he said, “My friends need me. I don’t have a choice.” He faced Zuko. “Let’s go save our friends.”

Chapter Text

It's the wrong time
For somebody new
It's a small crime
And I've got no excuse

9 Crimes by Damien Rice

Interlude: Suki’s Story

Chapter 13: The Wrong Time

FIVE YEARS AGO

“You’re leaving?”

Sheh and Hing whirled around from where they had been placing their things in a small boat. Hing walked up to her and knelt so that they were the same height. “You heard Shanar,” he said, referring to the village elder. “The Kyoshi Warriors who went to fight in the war, no one’s heard from them in far too long. Something’s happened to them.”

“So? Why don’t the Kyoshi Warriors here go look for them?”

“Shanar says we can’t spare anyone,” Sheh grumbled resentfully.

“Shanar should go jump into the lake and let the unagi eat him.”

Hing put his hands on her shoulders, looking her in the eyes. “Suki, my mother and sisters are out there.”

“I’m your sister!” Suki protested. She regretted it at once. It wasn’t fair at all to compare herself, a girl in a place that had scarcely been touched by the war in recent years, to three women who had been fighting Fire Nation soldiers for years and could be in serious danger. “…Or your daughter. Or something.” Hing was eleven years older than her, just between the right age to be her brother and the right age to be her father, so it was difficult to quantify their relationship. Indeed, ‘something’ was the best descriptor anyone had ever come up with. She shook her head, refusing to let the tears in her eyes fall. “Take me with you then,” she pleaded.

“No way!” Sheh exclaimed. “Are you crazy? You’re ten years old! We can’t take you into a war!”

“A lot of people would say you shouldn’t go into a war either,” she countered, looking pointedly at his left arm, which ended just past his shoulder. “You’ve never let that stop you. Why should I?”

Hing hugged her, and she finally, finally let herself cry, pressing her face into his shoulder. “I have to go save my family,” he murmured into her ear. “But I have to keep my other family safe too. The safest place for you is right here. Please, Suki. It’s hard enough that Sheh won’t stay behind. I can’t risk losing both of you. I need you to stay here. I need you to understand.”

“…I understand,” she whispered hoarsely. “But promise me you’ll come back. Both of you.” She pulled away from Hing to look sternly at him and Sheh. “Promise me you’ll both come back.”

“Of course we will,” Sheh scoffed loftily. “We all know nothing out there is scarier or more dangerous than Aunt Kelen, and I’ve faced her down plenty of times.”

“I can’t argue with that logic,” Suki agreed, wiping her eyes and sniffling.

“Suki, you’re incredible,” Hing promised. “You know that, right?”

“You tell me that at least every other day. I think you’ve already told me that once today.”

“Well, I just want to make sure,” Hing insisted. “You’re incredible, and you’re going to do amazing things someday when the time is right.”

Suki watched as her something and her something’s boyfriend set sail, and wondered how she would know when the time was right.

“I wish I knew where it all went wrong.”

Three years later, she still didn’t know how she would know. She joined the Kyoshi Warriors as soon as she was old enough, just over a year ago, and everyone agreed that she was devastatingly talented at fighting. Some of the moves came so naturally to her that many of the adults, when they thought she wasn’t listening, speculated that she had already known them. It was hard to recall what her life had been like before she’d shown up on the beaches of Kyoshi Island seven years ago, but she thought maybe they were right. Once in a while, when she was practicing her acrobatics, she had the strangest sense of déjà vu.

Hing had said she would do amazing things when the time was right. She still didn’t know how she would know when the time was right, but when it was, she would have to be ready. For years she had practiced as often as she could with whichever Kyoshi Warriors were willing to babysit. For the past year, she had practiced day and night in the training grounds when they were available and in her new bedroom in Aunt Kelen’s house when they weren’t. She memorized each move and committed all of them to her muscle memory to join whatever shards remained of her past. She had to be ready. She had to be ready.

She wasn’t ready.

The figure in Avatar Kyoshi’s shrine turned to face her as she approached, and his face was twisted and vivid blue, and she shrieked and threw her torch at him. She turned to run for help, but a sword wedged itself deep into her foot and pinned her in place. Adrenaline dulling the pain, she pulled the sword from her foot and pointed it at the intruder, who she now realized was wearing a mask. She felt like an idiot. “Who are you?” she demanded.

The intruder didn’t seem to notice her, which was impossible, since he’d stabbed her. He was staring at the torch, which had been extinguished upon contact with the stone floor.

“What are you doing here?” she challenged, pressing forward with the sword outstretched.

He ignored her still.

Infuriated, she jabbed the sword at his neck, which finally caught his attention. “Hey! Answer me!”

“Why?” he retorted, oddly breathless.

“Excuse me?” She flipped the sword in her hand and slammed the hilt into his shoulder. The impact turned him just enough for her to take his hands, put his wrists together, and pin him face-first into the wall. “You are on my island, in a shrine dedicated to my island’s namesake, and I am one of the Kyoshi Warriors who is dedicated to protecting this shrine! Now answer my questions, or I’ll – I’ll feed you to the unagi!”

Whatever trance he had been in after she’d caught him, he seemed to snap out of it, clearly registering her stutter as evidence of her nerves. “Will you, little girl?” he sneered at her. “What makes you think you can do that?” He slammed his head back into hers - stupid, stupid, I know better than to get that close - and ripped his arms from her hands - should have had a tighter grip, Ering always tells me to work on my grip - before a well-placed jab caused her grip on the sword to relax. He caught it as it fell and pointed it at her. “Now who’s feeding who to the unagi?”

“What’s going on here?” a thunderous voice demanded. Ani, the leader of the Kyoshi Warriors, rushed forward and easily disarmed the figure with a series of quick moves that Suki couldn’t even follow. Two more Kyoshi Warriors took each of the figure’s arms, pushed him to his knees, and held him down, while a fourth pulled Suki back and put herself protectively between Suki and the interrogation. Ani stood before the figure and snapped, “Who are you and why are you in Avatar Kyoshi’s shrine?”

“And why are you wearing a mask?” another Warrior asked.

“That’s none of your business!” the intruder barked.

“Like hell it isn’t!” Suki shouted at him. “You’re on our island, and you’re going to answer our questions!”

“Suki, hush,” Ani commanded, shooting a scowl over her shoulder. "I’m assuming you’re wearing that mask because you don’t want your face seen. If you don't answer our questions, it comes off.”

“…I’m looking for a man named Shozing,” the intruder grumbled. “Heard of him?”

“The assassin?” Ani stepped backwards, sounding alarmed. “Yeah, I’ve heard of him. What do you want with him?”

“What do you think?” the intruder retorted. “I want the bounty on his head.”

“And you think he’s here, on Kyoshi?”

“I know he is. His target is a woman named Sariph. Supposedly, she lives here.”

“Sariph?” Suki piped up, reeling. “No, she’s not here. She hasn’t been here in years. She went off to fight in the war before I was even born.”

The intruder eyed her warily. “I was told she was the leader of the Kyoshi Warriors.”

“She is. The ones who are fighting in the war. She’s their leader. I should know. I’m her granddaughter.”

The intruder huffed irritably. “Great. Then Shozing is probably leaving the island as we speak. If you hadn’t attacked me, I would have had him by now!”

“No, no, no. You attacked me! You stabbed my foot! Remember?”

“Yeah, after you threw a torch at my face! Who does that?”

“Enough!” Ani shouted. “If Shozing is still on the island, we need to stop him from getting off the island. You two, take this one to the prison for now.”

“What?” the intruder cried, outraged. “That’s ridiculous! On what grounds?”

“You intruded on sacred ground,” Ani reminded him. “You’ll need to face trial. You’ll be allowed to keep your mask, if you like, unless you’re found guilty. But you’re not going anywhere.”

“You’re making a mistake,” the intruder insisted, his voice taking on a note of hysteria. “You need me. I know how to find him!”

“You just said he was probably leaving the island as we speak,” Ani pointed out. “If you didn’t want to spend a few nights in prison, maybe you should have been more careful. And you…” She turned to Suki. “What are you even doing, wandering around in the middle of the night?”

Suki had an answer, but it wasn’t a good one, so she glared mutinously at Ani and kept her mouth shut.

Ani sighed heavily. “Whatever. Go back to your aunt’s house and stay there. I’ll deal with you in the morning.”

Suki scowled, but she didn’t argue. Silently, she turned on her heel and walked away in the direction of Aunt Kelen’s house. Muted footsteps behind her indicated a Kyoshi Warrior had been sent to follow her and make sure she went home. It wasn't the first time. This is ridiculous, she fumed. I should be out there helping them catch Shozing, not going home. And that masked guy! The nerve of him! We don’t need his help. He should have just told the Kyoshi Warriors that Shozing was here and let us take care of it. But no, all people like him care about is money.

As she reached her home, the adrenaline rush of fighting the masked intruder was wearing off. Her anger at the intruder and at Ani lessened, but that did nothing to dull her desire to help them catch Shozing. What would Hing say? she wondered. Hing had always been more level-headed than her and Sheh, often pulling them out of fights that their impulsiveness and overconfidence got them into and smoothing things over. Then again, Hing had been more than capable of standing his ground, too, when it was worth it. He had always been very good at choosing his battles. Suki wished she’d listened to him more often when he was around. Now, her closest thing to an advisor was Aunt Kelen, who put much more stock in rules and authority than Suki could ever bring herself to. Was this one of the battles that she should choose? Was this time the right time?

She hesitated, one hand on the door to her home, ready to slide it open. The intruder had said something about knowing how to find Shozing. What if he’d been telling the truth? If Shozing escaped, he would surely go on to kill many more people. This intruder was a bounty hunter. He might only be interested in money, and she couldn’t know how far his morality would stretch to get it if he had any morality at all, but at least he did make his living by putting criminals being bars. If she had to choose between him on the streets and Shozing, well, it was an easy choice. Her mind made, she went inside to lose her stalker, she went to her bedroom, and she climbed out the window. From there, she crept to the jail, waited for the two Kyoshi Warriors to finish locking the intruder up, and crept up to the bars between them. “Hey,” she hissed. The intruder’s head jerked up. “What do I call you?”

He eyed her suspiciously. “Some people call me the Blue Spirit.”

She resisted the urge to roll her eyes at the incredibly pretentious name. “Blue Spirit, do you really know how to find Shozing?”

His eyes widened. “Yes. I swear I do. You have my word.”

“Very well.” She took some chains from where they hung on a nearby hook and gestured for him to come closer. “Let me chain you up, and then I’ll let you out so you can bring me to him.”

“Are you joking?” he scoffed. “Why the hell would I do that?”

“Because it’s... the right thing to do...?”

She really hadn’t thought about how to convince him to help her, and that must have been obvious in her answer, for he laughed at her outright in response. “No way. If I do this, you’re going to let me go, and I get to keep the bounty.”

“No. No bounty. But… once he’s been handed over, I’ll get Ani to consider it atonement for your crimes.”

“’Crimes,’” the Blue Spirit echoed incredulously. “Fine. Whatever. Just get me out of here.” He turned his back to the bars and held his hands out behind him. Suki reached through, sliding one end of the chains through the bars and passing it to her other hand, and chained his hands together behind his back. Then she took a pair of keys and unlocked the cell, freeing him. “Great. This way.”

“What, no thanks?” she retorted irritably, following him nonetheless.

“Thanks? For what? Releasing me from the cell I was unfairly locked in? Because of you?”

“How is this my fault?”

“If you hadn’t caught me, none of this would have happened.”

“If you hadn’t been intruding on sacred ground in the middle of the night, I wouldn’t have caught you!”

“Well, I was hunting a murderer. What’s your excuse?”

“I don’t have to explain myself to you,” Suki huffed.

He stopped and turned to face her. “How is that fair?” he challenged. “I, a stranger to your customs, get arrested for doing exactly the same thing you, a native, did. You owe me an explanation. What were you doing that was so much more important, more noble than bringing a criminal to justice?”

“Like you care. You just want the money.” He had a point, though…. “I was coming to pray to Avatar Kyoshi in the hopes that she could give me some advice.”

“Advice about what?”

Suki sighed. “I’m trying to become a better Kyoshi Warrior, but I’m just not sure how. I’m miles ahead of my peers in terms of fighting, but I’m reckless and careless. I’m not even close to being a real Kyoshi Warrior.”

“But how did you think Avatar Kyoshi was going to help you? I mean, didn’t she get reborn into the last Avatar anyway? Did her spirit truly pass on, or is it with Avatar Roku, or whatever Avatar is out there?”

“I don’t know!” Suki threw her hands in the air. “But I’m not asking Aunt Kelen for help, and I’m not asking any of the other Warriors anyway. They wouldn’t understand.”

“Understand what?”

“That it’s not enough to be good at just fighting! I have to be better, smarter – “

There was a loud clink as the chains hit the floor. “Careless indeed,” the Blue Spirit purred, and he ran for it.

She dashed after him, but he scaled a nearby house and started leaping from rooftop to rooftop on his way back to the jail. She’d made a terrible mistake. She was never going to be a Kyoshi Warrior now. Furious with herself, she ran towards the jail on the ground. By the time she got there, he and his swords were long gone. She went back to the shrine. To her relief, one Warrior was still there investigating. “Help!” she cried. “The intruder escaped!”

“Looking back, it feels like every time I had a decision to make, I made the wrong one.”

Two years later, the Avatar showed up on Kyoshi Island, closely followed by that same intruder. Any mixed feelings she had towards the Blue Spirit rapidly became very, very distinctly negative. Whether he had been in the wrong back then or not, he was most certainly in the wrong now. No person could call themselves moral or even morally ambiguous while hunting down the world’s last hope for peace just for money. Even theft would be a better way to survive, and after all that time, even the most remote places in the Earth Kingdom had heard of the legendary Blue Spirit, so Suki was well-aware that he could make a living perfectly easily without hunting Aang.

“Have you ever heard of the Blue Spirit?”

“Yes…? Why?”

“Oh, he kidnapped me earlier. That’s why I was missing when that admiral got here.”

“He kidnapped you?”

“Yeah, but he let me go when he saw that ship.”

“Of course he did! He didn’t want them to catch him!”

“What? No, he said it was because they would burn down Kyoshi Village if they didn’t see me.”

“Aang, he was lying. He’s a bounty hunter. He doesn't care about the village. He just cares about the money. That's what he said to me when I met him.”

A few days later, the Blue Spirit tied her to another bounty hunter, leapt out of a window that was definitely well over a hundred feet above ground, and sank into the ocean. He didn’t resurface. Later, Suki would find a million ways to rationalize the decision she made next, but the truth was that someone who had just helped Aang meet with his past life was drowning, and she was bound by her duty as the leader of the Kyoshi Warriors to save people regardless of their morality. Suki dove back in and tugged him out. He wasn’t breathing. She took a deep breath, took his mask off, and forced oxygen into his mouth. He inhaled sharply and vomited water onto the ground, and that was when she took a good, long look at him.

He was the kid from the marketplace who had distracted her while Aang wandered off. But more than that, she realized, he was a kid. He could easily be the same age as her. She had so many questions. She wanted to know where he’d learned to fight the way he did. She wanted to know why he was a bounty hunter. She wanted to know if he really did have some alternative, more sympathetic reason for kidnapping Aang like the reason Aang had accused him of having earlier. Then again, if his family really had asked him to capture the Avatar, he must be Fire Nation. So he was her enemy either way, right?

Three years ago, or maybe even three months ago, she would have believed that. But that night she was still thinking about him, and her list of questions was growing. Why hadn’t he tied himself up to the rope instead and had her be the one to leap out and cut him free? Why had he let himself rise until he was higher than the other bounty hunter before letting them both start falling? Why hadn’t he told her he couldn’t swim before jumping? Had he thought so little of her that he would rather risk drowning than let her in on one of his weaknesses? That was so ridiculous! She was the leader of the Kyoshi Warriors! She was one of the good guys! Didn’t he realize that?

She hadn’t acted like one of the good guys, though. She’d thrown a torch at him. It hadn’t hit him, but if it had, who know what could have happened? And that burn on his face – spirits, he must have been freaked out when she threw that torch. That poor kid. What had even happened to him? If his family was Fire Nation like she suspected, how did he get that scar? Maybe a kid in some colonized Earth Kingdom village could have gotten a scar like that for insubordination or something, but that wasn’t the kind of scar someone might get in a fight. To have a scar that covered almost the entire left side of his face but hadn’t damaged his eye…. That scar had been given by someone older and smarter, and it had been given deliberately. But his family was Fire Nation. Something terrible occurred to Suki, and she banished that train of thought right away. She couldn’t let herself have too much sympathy for the Blue Spirit, even if it was well-deserved. He was the enemy. She couldn’t ever let herself forget that.

Still, she had to wonder why he’d stuck around in Avatar Roku’s temple to help her and Aang get to Roku and escape. The Blue Spirit was, as she'd heard since leaving Kyoshi Island, nothing if not stubborn once he’d fixed his eye on a particular bounty, but risking discovery by Admiral Zhao in a sacred temple within Fire Nation territory seemed a bit far even for him. Why was he so determined to take Aang? Why was he so determined to keep Aang from Zhao even if it meant risking his own safety and freedom? The more she thought about it, the more she had to conclude he was either a Fire Nation boy trying way too hard to impress his family or a bounty hunter with an actually decent bone in his body (probably just one, though).

“How’d you three get out, anyway?”

“Blue tied June and me to a rope while Shyu shattered the glass in the window. We wrapped the rope around one of those columns in the temple and jumped out.”

“That must have been terrifying!”

“It was probably more terrifying for him, honestly. He wasn’t tied to anything when he jumped out of that window. He hung on my side of the rope until I was closer to the water, and then he cut me loose and waited until June was closer to the water, and then he just… let go. And he can’t even swim!”

“He can’t swim?!”

“No! I had to drag him back to the shore. Did I… Did I make the wrong decision?”

“No way! You had to save him, after that. Besides, between the two of us, I think we’ll be just fine.”

“Well, I sure hope you’re right.”

About two weeks later, Aang still needed to learn waterbending, the entire world was at stake, and there was a stolen waterbending scroll at the nearest pier. She slipped it up her sleeve and strode out of there with her head held high. It was one of the worst decisions she’d ever made, she realized hours later, tied up beside her new traveling companions Sokka and Katara while a group of pirates lie in wait for Aang’s reappearance. She had no idea where Aang would be in the middle of the night other than their campsite. She had a feeling it was the fault of Blue and that other bounty hunter. She didn’t know what to think about that. If Aang didn’t come back, she doubted the pirates would just let her, Sokka, and Katara go with a warning. There would be some sort of reparations, possibly in the form of a taken hand or foot, but more than likely in the form of a life, or two, or three. Still, if Aang was with Blue and June, there was always a chance they would get into another situation where Blue decided to let Aang go rather than let Zhao capture him. At least this way he might survive and save the world without her. Maybe Suki could convince them to just let Sokka and Katara go. She was the one who stole the scroll. If anyone –

“What’s going on? Appa, what happened?” Suki’s spirits somehow lifted and sank simultaneously. For better or worse, there was Aang, unsurprisingly with Blue in tow. “This isn’t good.”

“You think? Where the hell are your friends?”

“Right here,” the pirate captain announced smugly.

Suki listened numbly as Blue and the pirates spoke, trying and failing to catch Blue’s gaze. What is he thinking? What is his plan? Why won’t he look at me? He did look at her, finally, as the pirate captain patted her head and threatened her with words she desperately wished to somehow unhear. He looked at her, and his next words deflated all her hopes for survival. “You act like I care what happens to them, anyway. I’m just here for the Avatar.” It wasn’t the words themselves that disappointed her. It was the way his voice shot up an octave, laced with urgency and despair. For once, his smoothness had completely abandoned him. He was terrified – on their behalves, oddly enough – and it showed, and it meant that he didn’t have a plan at all. He was just stalling.

Well. It looked like it was up to Suki this time. These knots are too tight. I can’t break free. I might be able to fight them off without being untied if I had help, but I doubt Katara and Sokka can fight. I’ve seen earthbenders and firebenders use their feet in a fight though. Katara might be untrained, but she is a waterbender, and she’s been practicing with that scroll all day. She must have learned something from it. Suki caught Katara’s gaze, nodded to the water, and kicked the ground to emphasize her foot. Katara tilted her head. Scowling, Suki repeated the gestures more emphatically. Eyes widening, Katara looked thoughtfully at the water and then her own foot. She kicked. She kicked again. She kicked a third time, and a stream of water shot from the river beside them and captured one of the pirates, yanking him into its depths.

Soon, Suki, Sokka, Katara, and Aang were safe on Appa’s back, along with their supplies and Blue with his hands and feet bound together. She felt bad about that, but it was a necessary precaution. Weirdly good person or not, he was still the enemy. He was an enemy that deserved an apology, though, she decided. They landed just beyond Omashu. A few feet from Appa, she untied him, bowed, and finally apologized for her actions in Avatar Kyoshi’s shrine two years ago. He was nice about it, if a bit awkward. He even apologized in turn for his own actions back then. He was so confusing, and the more she spoke to him, the more confused she got.

That night (or, rather, that morning), as she tried to sleep through Sokka’s obnoxiously loud snoring, she wondered about him again. He seemed to like her and Aang, and Katara too. She could hardly spite him for disliking Sokka, especially when by all appearances he disliked Sokka on principle for his actions towards Aang. It was perhaps a bit hypocritical of him to judge Sokka for kicking Aang out of his tribe when Blue himself was persistently attempting to imprison Aang and deliver him to the Fire Lord, but there it was. She wondered for the first time if she could befriend him and bring him over to her side. She was more the type to stab first and ask questions later, but she found herself strangely reluctant now to consider him her enemy. Everything would be easier if she just knew why he was trying to kidnap Aang.

“Hey, Suki.”

“Yeah, Aang?”

“Where do you think Blue learned to fight like that?”

“…I… don’t know…?”

“I wish I could fight like that. Maybe next time he kidnaps me, I’ll ask him to teach me.”

“…To be honest, I’m kind of hoping he doesn’t kidnap you again.”

“He’s not so bad, though.”

“I guess not. But you shouldn’t get too comfortable with him, either. He’s still trying to bring you to the Fire Lord. You understand that, right?”

“He’s not trying too hard. He and the other bounty hunter had me today, but when we heard Katara scream, he let me go. He actually fought off the other one so we could escape.”

“Aang….”

“I’m just saying, he can’t be such a bad guy if he fought his friend to save us, right?”

“Sure, but don’t get attached. He’s still not on our side.”

Suki ate her own words a few days later. Katara and Sokka lie sick and hallucinating in a cave, and Blue appeared before her informing her that Aang was being held captive by Zhao. She couldn’t let Zhao leave with Aang, but she couldn’t leave Sokka and Katara, either. Blue promised to bring Aang back to her. The Blue Spirit, the infamously merciless and unrelenting bounty hunter who had stopped at nothing to hunt her and Aang down and had vowed to kidnap Aang and deliver him to the Fire Nation, promised to bring Aang back to her just this once, and spirits help her, she believed him. She had no choice but to believe him, given the circumstances. Even if she’d had a choice, part of her thought that maybe she would have believed him anyway.

She sent him off after Aang, sticking a frozen frog in each sick teen’s mouth at Blue’s recommendation, still reeling from the fact that he had actually spoken of his mother even if it was just to tell her that she’d had the same sickness three years ago. Her regret built up steadily as hours passed with no sight of Aang or Blue. She’d really, really thought he was a decent person. She’d thought that maybe he had some honor to him, and he’d promised to bring Aang back this time, so where was he?

Katara recovered, and Sokka recovered enough that they could at least trust him to stay behind without supervision, so Suki and Katara rode Appa all the way to the stronghold Blue had spoken of, hoping beyond hope that Blue hadn’t already stolen away with their friend. Quite a scene awaited them; Blue and Aang were both riding the shirshu, sitting in the middle of the courtyard surrounded by soldiers. Aang’s gaze hooked on them. “Appa!”

“Appa?” Blue echoed.

Perking up, Aang threw Blue off of the shirshu and at Suki as they swooped down to snatch them. Suki caught Blue by the front of his tunic while Katara latched onto Aang as he jumped towards them. The four of them peeled off, even Blue seeming almost giddy with relief. They reached the cave, and Suki made her way inside with the boomerang Blue had thoughtfully retrieved. She was all too aware of Blue and Aang hanging back to talk about something privately as Katara followed her inside, but they were right there. Surely Blue wouldn’t do anything to Aang with Appa there and Suki just inside the cave.

Aang walked inside soon enough, an uncharacteristically pensive look on his face as he approached her. “Hey Suki, do we have enough for one more?”

Suki quirked an eyebrow at Aang, then at Blue, who hovered with his back to them all too conspicuously right outside the cave. “I guess so.”

“Are we feeding the bounty hunter now?” Sokka complained.

“Hush,” Katara scolded. “He just saved Aang from that Fire Nation admiral, I think you can manage some hospitality.”

“He only saved Aang so he could kidnap him himself!”

“Do you see him attacking any of us right this second? No.”

“Blue’s done more for Aang than you have,” Suki pointed out mildly, smothering a smirk before it could reach her face.

Predictably, Sokka shot to his feet at that. “What? He tried to kidnap him!”

“He also saved him three times now. Hey, Blue, don’t be a stranger! Come inside! It’s freezing out there.”

Though he was obviously uncomfortable at first, Blue settled down surprisingly quickly. He fit so well with the four of them. Part of Suki desperately wanted to ask about his family and his reasons for kidnapping Aang, but the more sensible parts of her decided to sacrifice her curiosity for the sake of keeping dinner civil. Still, the more time she spent with Blue, the more she felt like he should rightfully be on their side, helping them, and the more she wondered what was stopping him. Because he was obviously lonely, and he obviously liked them, and he was obviously a decent person despite everything, so why couldn’t he just stop chasing Aang and start helping them?

It didn’t matter. Suki had assumed the worst of him once, and she had a sinking feeling that that moment so long ago had been the catalyst for everything that had led him here. The best way to make reparations now was to give him the benefit of the doubt in all the ways that didn’t endanger Aang. She wouldn’t give up on Blue’s potential to be a good guy. Even if she couldn’t convince him to become one, she could give him the chance with every opportunity that the world afforded her.

“And even when I did everything I could, I can’t help but feel like I should have done more. Do you know what I mean?”

“…I do. That's one of the things you get used to as a leader.”

Suki watched as the ocean lapped gently at the edge of the surface she stood upon.

“Suki.”

Less than a week earlier, that same, gentle ocean had killed countless Fire Nation soldiers, wielding Aang like a weapon in defense of the North Pole.

“Suki?”

She wanted to be grateful. She really, truly did. And yet…

“Suki, what is it?”

“Nothing,” she said numbly. “It’s nothing, Aang.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Why don’t we split up? You and Katara look over there, and Sokka and I will look over here.”

Aang met her gaze, his childish features twisted grotesquely by the same unspoken fear that sank its fangs deeper and deeper into Suki too with every passing hour. “…Okay,” he agreed in a small voice. He and Katara turned and headed in the direction she’d indicated, Katara casting a concerned, knowing frown at her as she left.

Sokka made his way forward to stand beside her. “What is it?” he asked quietly.

Suki gestured wordlessly to the opposite side of the canal, where a single dao blade lay on the ground.

“Oh, geez,” Sokka breathed. He glanced nervously at her. “What does that mean? That’s not – that doesn’t really mean – “ He paused, took a deep breath, and continued more calmly, “That doesn’t mean he’s not – y’know. I mean, with everything going, he definitely could have just dropped it, right?”

She almost wanted to laugh. “No. He couldn’t have. Blue would never have just dropped half of his sword and left it there, not under any circumstances.” Suki shook her head. “He went after Zhao, Sokka. Zhao.” At that, she did laugh, albeit briefly and borderline hysterically. “I mean, are you really surprised?” Sokka flinched, but she couldn’t find it in herself to care. Blue was dead. He was dead. That poor, lonely, stupid kid with the dead mother and the dead uncle and the unexplained vendetta was gone now. “Damn him,” she bit out. It took her a second to realize she’d spoken out loud, but once she’d started, the words came tumbling out. “Damn him! Why couldn’t he just stay put? Why did he have to go after Zhao? Why was he even here in the first place?”

“Suki – “

“It’s his own fault! He should never have been chasing us to begin with! He could have done anything with his life! He knew how to fight, he knew how to sail, he knew how to track – he was so smart, Sokka! He could have been so much more than this. And he had every chance to change his mind. When he brought Aang back to us and had dinner with us after Zhao captured them, when he saved us after the pirates captured us, when he helped Aang and I escape Avatar Roku’s temple – he could have worked with us instead of against us! And then he would be alive!”

“He is alive,” Sokka corrected evenly. Suki’s jaw dropped as he looked her in the eye, eyebrows narrowed decisively. “In a fight between Blue and Zhao, I’m betting my money on Blue. I don’t care if one of his stupid swords is here. I don’t care if you’ve never seen him without it. I won’t believe he’s dead until I see it with my own eyes.” Suki watched as Sokka swam across the canal, retrieved the dao blade, and returned with it. “It’s bad enough that Yue’s dead,” Sokka uttered, his voice catching on the last word. Suki’s heart leapt into her throat. It was the first time he’d acknowledged it since it happened. “I won’t let Blue be dead too.”

It’s not like you have a choice, she thought bitterly, perhaps unfairly. She didn’t correct him again, though. If it made him feel better to believe Blue was alive somewhere with half of a sword, then she would let him. At least Sokka’s optimism would probably make Aang feel better, too. “Okay. I’ll ask someone to make a sheathe for it so no one gets cut on it. We’ll keep it, and when we see him again, we’ll give it back.”

Sokka smiled warmly at her. “Sounds good.” He patted his satchel fondly. “I can give his knife back to him then, too.”

They were still at the North Pole, on the verge of leaving, when Aang burst into their lodgings with a letter. Thank you, was all that it said. Try as she might, Suki could think of just one person who would send them such an odd, ominous letter. Aang, Sokka, and Katara took it as proof that Blue was out there somewhere. Suki didn’t. That letter sounded an awful lot like a goodbye.

“So you understand, then, that when I say that one of the things that went wrong was - well, was him meeting you three instead of coming back to us... it’s not about you at all. Because if he'd been with us, this would have gone much differently.”

“…Yeah. I get it. I wish he'd never met us too.”

She didn’t find out why Blue would send a goodbye letter to them for a few weeks. She, Aang, Sokka, Katara, and their newest addition Toph were at the Misty Palms Oasis. Aang was being enthusiastically interrogated by an Earth Kingdom professor named Zei when Toph pulled her to the side and said, “Hey, Suki, I overheard someone saying something about wanted posters – are there posters up here?”

Suki looked around. “Yeah, there are. Why?”

“This is gonna sound kinda weird, but could you do me a favor and look for someone named Zuko? He’s a friend of mine.”

Toph was strange, and Suki had learned not to question the strange things that she said. “…Sure.” Suki led Toph to the wall with the posters and scanned them. “Hey, what do you know? There he – “

“...Suki?” Toph prompted. “…Suki…?”

“I don’t believe this.” Suki stared incredulously at the poster. “I don’t believe this - “ She knew that face. Spirits, she definitely knew that face. She would never forget that face. She’d shared a meal with that face – “We had dinner with the Fire Lord’s son?!”

“Really?” Toph asked interestedly as Sokka and Katara dropped what they were doing to stare at her in bewilderment. “I didn’t know you guys met.”

Suki gestured violently to Zuko’s poster. “That’s him! That’s Blue! That’s the Blue Spirit!”

“How can you be so sure?” Sokka challenged, striding over to look at it himself. “You said you only saw his face once - ”

“Sokka, half his face was burned off.”

“More than one person could have half of their face burned off,” Sokka disagreed, his eyes skimming the description. “Look, it says here that he ‘refused to capture the Avatar,’ right? But Blue never refused to capture Aang, he was just bad at it and kept letting him go instead.”

“You don’t think that constitutes refusal in the eyes of the Fire Nation?” Katara countered mildly, joining them. “I mean, can you imagine Blue walking up to the Fire Lord and saying, ‘Hey, I had the Avatar, but then his friends were attacked by pirates, so I let him go?’ Somehow I doubt that would go over well.”

“There’s no way Blue was Fire Nation,” Sokka stated adamantly, shaking his head. “You guys are crazy. Right, Aang? Back me up here.”

Aang hesitated. “Yeah, uh…, sorry, Sokka, but they’re right. That was Blue’s name. Zuko.”

“He gave you a name?” Suki questioned, intrigued.

“…Actually, he told me exactly who he was.”

“Aang,” Sokka cried exasperatedly. “Aang, you can’t let us eat dinner with Fire Nation people without even telling us who they are!”

“Wait, are you guys talking about that bounty hunter?” Toph interjected. “Is Zuko the bounty hunter you were telling me about? That guy who was half-heartedly trying to catch Aang but kept saving you all instead?”

“I guess so,” Sokka confirmed grumpily. His jaw dropped. “Ugh!” He yanked Blue’s knife out of his bag. “This belongs to the Dragon of the West!”

“No, it belongs to Blue.” Katara raised an eyebrow at him, unimpressed.

“Well, yeah, but it was bought by the Dragon of the West! The Dragon of the West did, at one point, possess this knife!”

Toph snorted. “What, are you afraid of Fire Nation cooties?” Sokka made a disgusted noise as she continued. “I mean, it’s kinda too late for that anyway. Like Suki said, you already shared a meal with the Fire Lord’s son.”

Sokka looked down at the knife in his hand, then back up at the poster, his nose wrinkled and brow furrowed. By the time his gaze landed back on the knife, his expression had softened. “…I am so confused.”

“Zuko was banished,” Aang explained. “Disowned and banished.”

“So when he was trying to catch you…”

Aang nodded emphatically, affirming Suki’s unspoken conclusion. “He didn’t care about the money. He just wanted to go home and take down the Fire Lord from the inside.”

“But if he’s wanted now….” Suki frowned at the wanted poster. “He must have gotten caught. That’s why we got that letter. It was a goodbye after all.”

“But didn’t you get that letter before you met me?” Toph pointed out.

“…Yes?”

“I met him after you met me.”

The connection Toph was urging her to make was so jarringly cheerful that it took Suki a few moments to believe what she was hearing. “So… he’s… alive?”

“Last I checked, he was perfectly okay,” Toph chirped.

“He’s okay!” Aang echoed jubilantly. He lunged for Toph’s shoulders. “How long ago was that? How was he doing? Where was he going?” He scowled suddenly. “Why didn’t he contact us?!”

“Um, he considered his presence a huge threat to literally anyone’s safety?” Toph answered, baffled. “And he was kind of right? I mean, at least half of the world thinks you’re great, Twinkle Toes. But the same half of the world that likes you hates Zuko for being Fire Nation, and the other half hates him for being on your side. So no matter where he goes, everyone’s going to hate him.”

Suki felt the good mood slowly dissipate as Toph laid out all the facts. “But we could help him,” Katara said in an injured voice. “Didn’t he trust us?”

“Not everything’s about you, Sugar Queen,” Toph sneered. Katara’s face turned stormy as Toph continued, and Suki braced herself to break up a fight. “He was trying to keep you all safe.”

“How was he planning to keep himself safe?” Katara demanded.

Before Suki could jump in to calm everyone down, Toph retorted, “To be honest, he wasn’t really. Until I suggested he go to Ba Sing Se.”

“Ba Sing Se?” Sokka looked up from the dagger, a fierce determination growing in his eyes. “So he might be there right now?”

“I mean, I doubt it, but he was definitely on his way there when we parted ways.”

“So that’s where we can find him.” He grinned. “We have to go to Ba Sing Se!”

“Didn’t you hear me? I said I doubt he’s there – “

“But he will be,” Sokka pressed. “Hey, wait, I’ve got a better idea – where did you last see him, Toph?”

“Somewhere around Tu Zin. You know, when we had our first fight with Azula while Appa was shedding like a maniac.”

Sokka pulled his map out of his satchel and spread it out against the wall, covering the wanted posters up there. “Okay, so it looks like the only way to get to Ba Sing Se is through the Serpent’s Pass, which is pretty much a straight shot from Tu Zin across the Si Wong Desert. So if we just fly across the desert and stay low to the ground….” He turned back to face the group, grimacing. “I know it’s a long shot, but we could at least try.”

“Professor Zei is looking for some fabled library that’s supposed to be somewhere in the desert,” Katara piped up. “Aang and I were talking about helping him look for it on Appa, so it’d kind of be like killing two arctic hens with one stone.”

“I doubt we’ll find him, but it’s not like we’ve got anything better to do,” Toph opined.

Suki didn’t bother asking Aang’s opinion. She already knew what he wanted to do. “Okay. I guess we’re going to the Si Wong Desert then!”

“I knew you’d get it. I love our friends, but at the end of the day, they’re just a bunch of stupid kids who had no idea what they were getting into. You and I, we’re the ones who’ve had to lead them, guide them, and protect them. And even though we don’t always see eye to eye, there’s no denying that you know how to inspire people, and inspire loyalty. For better or worse, you've always been a great leader..., exactly the kind of person who could unite a makeshift army against the Fire Nation.”

Weeks later, in Ba Sing Se, Suki wandered the streets in search of something very, very important. She had never heard of abnormal psychology on Kyoshi Island, but during her time in Omashu, she’d educated herself on a variety of personality disorders and mental disabilities while she’d had the chance, seeking to improve her awareness to no particular end. Now she sought treatment for something very specific, and she had to get it done before Aang, Sokka, Katara, and most importantly, Zuko returned from their trip.

Finally, she found the clinic she’d been looking for. It was much nicer than the one in Omashu. Bracing herself, she stepped inside. “Excuse me,” she greeted the two occupants, “do either of you work here?”

“I’m actually a volunteer,” one woman replied. “But I’ve gone through a lot of training here, so if you need help, I am most certainly qualified!”

“I do.”

Suki glanced uncertainly at the volunteer’s friend. The volunteer followed her gaze. “Could you excuse us please? And tell Eni we have a visitor?”

“…Sure.” The friend rose and exited the clinic.

“I’m Hila,” the volunteer said.

“I’m S- Sariph,” Suki answered, remembering at the last second that she didn’t want to be identified as an associate of the Avatar and, by extension, Zuko. The clinic promised anonymity, but Suki wasn’t sure how much she trusted that.

“So, Sariph, what do you need help with?”

Suki desperately hoped that Zuko would never find out about this. “I have this friend who I think needs some help, and I don’t know how long we’re going to be here in Ba Sing Se, but I’d like to try and get him some kind of therapy before we leave. I just don’t know how to convince him.”

“Therapy for what?” Hila tilted her head to the side, and something about the innocent, detached curiosity in her gaze was immediately familiar to Suki. She just couldn’t place it. If only she weren’t concealing her identity, she might have asked if they’d met somewhere before.

”Um…, a lot of things, I guess? I mean, I know – or at least I think one of his parents was abusive. It’s not just that, though. He’s been through a lot, in general. So I think he has…” Suki wracked her brain… “P… PD... no, PSD... it’s some kind of trauma thing.”

“PTSD,” Hila supplied. “Post-traumatic stress disorder?”

“Yes! That’s it. He has a lot of the symptoms. I mean, at least, according to a pamphlet I read in Omashu. Nightmares, hypervigilance, social isolation – the biggest one is self-destructive behavior. It’s a huge problem with him. I don’t feel like letting him out of my sight most of the time for fear of what he’ll do next.”

Hila nodded as she spoke, and when she finished, Hila said, “That sounds like PTSD to me. Of course, I would have to meet him to diagnose him – although I’m not actually qualified to diagnose him myself, technically. But you said this is a result of child abuse, right?”

“I guess, among other things. Why?”

“Well, child abuse is more commonly associated with Complex PTSD.”

“Is that… Is that very different?”

“Not too different. Other symptoms that aren’t too common in typical PTSD are – let’s see – “ She plucked a pamphlet from the desk. “Explosive anger, preoccupation with revenge, a sense of being completely different from other human beings – “

“Yeah, that’s, uh, that’s kind of his whole personality. That’s weirdly specific.”

Suki wanted to ask if Hila had experience with this, but felt it would be insensitive. Thankfully, Hila offered this information on her own. “I have a friend who was abused. Well, two, but one of them I haven’t spoken to in years. They both had those symptoms as well.”

Before Suki could even consider what a coincidence that was, Hali’s eyes widened sharply, and suddenly there were hands made of rock on her mouth and her arms and –

- and then nothing.

“No. You are absolutely not asking me to do what I think you’re asking me to do! You can’t be serious!”

“Wait – just let me explain – “

“There’s no way I can do that, Suki!”

“Jet, please!”

”…Wake up. Come on, come on, wake up…. Suki, please!”

Suki stirred, drowsily taking in her surroundings. “What… Jet? Where are we?”

Jet slumped backwards against the cave wall. His hands were clearly bound, but in the darkness, she couldn’t see what by. “No clue.”

“I think someone mentioned Lake Laogai?” Smellerbee suggested, and Suki noticed her and Longshot for the first time. “Joo Dee said it was some kind of vacation spot, but knowing how this place was run before we got here, I wouldn’t be surprised if there was more to it.”

Suki looked around. “Where’s Toph?”

“She escaped,” Smellerbee stated. “Hard to contain an earthbender with earthbending, right? And they could hardly have stuffed her in some metal prison, seeing as she can bend metal now. I don’t know what they were planning on doing with her, but either way, I bet she’s out there right now trying to find us.”

A woman strode into the cell, surrounded by Dai Li agents. It was Azula. “Well, well, well,” she purred, her voice as sharp and electric as her bending. “If it isn’t the… ‘Freedom Fighters,’ and company.” She smirked at Suki. “I could hardly believe it when Mai told me you’d walked right up to her and Ty Lee without recognizing either of them. I suppose we did an excellent job on our Earth Kingdom disguises.”

Suki recoiled, thinking over her conversation with ‘Hila.’ She’d given all that information about Zuko directly to the enemy. She may not have identified him by name, but if Ty Lee had known who she was the whole time, it couldn’t have been a difficult connection to make....

“What were you even doing in that clinic, anyway?” Azula waved her hand dismissively. “Never mind. I have better things to do than listen to your prattling. Ty Lee!”

…Wait a second. Ty Lee hadn’t relayed their conversation to Azula yet?

Ty Lee strode into the room from around the corner, looking anywhere but at Suki. “Yes, Azula?”

“Will you keep an eye on these – “ Azula was interrupted by the distant sound of metal… being bent. Caught off-guard, Azula paused in her instructions to step towards the exit.

“Let me go!” Suki blurted out. “You’ll pay for this!”

Azula glanced back at her, vaguely amused. “I highly doubt it. The only people paying for this will be the Avatar and my brother.”

“Even when they come, you’ll never catch them,” Jet taunted. “You can’t take all of us!”

“With the Dai Li on my side, I certainly can.”

“Not if – “

“Dai Li, silence the prisoners.”

In two swift motions, both Suki’s and Jet’s mouths were covered by the Dai Li’s detached rock hands. She could only hope they’d given Toph enough time to find a hiding place.

“That’s better. Ty Lee, keep an eye on them. I will be back shortly.” Azula left the cell, the Dai Li on her tail. Only three of them remained with Ty Lee.

Finally, Ty Lee locked eyes with Suki, looking guiltier than Suki would have believed anyone from the Fire Nation could had she not known Zuko. After a few moments, Ty Lee bit out, “Dai Li, remove the muffle.”

“Pardon me?” one of them inquired nervously.

Ty Lee straightened her back. “Remove the muffle,” she repeated, gesturing at Suki. “Just from that one.”

The Dai Li exchanged glances.

“Did I stutter?” Ty Lee barked.

“No, ma’am,” said the one who had spoken the first time, and he summoned the muffle from Suki’s mouth.

“Thank you. Now stand watch outside. I don’t need you hovering over me like some child who needs protecting. I can take care of myself.”

The Dai Li reluctantly left the cell.

“…Let me guess,” Suki drawled after a few moments of tense silence. “You keep my secrets, I keep yours?”

“That sounds like a fair trade to me,” Ty Lee commented.

“Not to me. Not when I have much, much less to lose.” Suki leaned forward. “What would your princess think of you gossiping about her, with enemies no less?”

Ty Lee’s face went a shade paler. “I wasn’t gossiping.”

“You weren’t?”

“I was – exchanging information.”

“Is that so? You certainly seemed to know everything I told you about Zuko before I said a word.” Suki tilted her head thoughtfully. “So you two were friends, huh? Before he was banished? And you just… let him wander the world alone? What kind of a friend does that make you?”

“I was Azula’s friend first,” Ty Lee defended herself.

“Right. And she’s doing swimmingly, as you intimated to me earlier.”

“There’s nothing I can – “ Ty Lee shouted, then cut herself off sharply, looking over her shoulder at the shadows of the Dai Li. When they failed to shift, she turned back to Suki and hissed, “What should I have done about that, huh? Should I have reported the Fire Lord for child abuse? Who was going to investigate that?!” Her voice cracked. She stepped backwards. “This is the way it has to be. This is what’s best for everyone. Zuko is going home now.”

“Home to what?” Suki challenged. Out of the corner of her eye, Longshot flinched, violently. Suki ignored him.

“Zuko is smart. When he gets home, he’ll realize that he has to give in. He’ll tell Azula what she wants to know. Or maybe he’ll even make something up. I don’t care. I don’t care about the Avatar or the war or anything. I just want my friends to be happy.”

Where Suki had once thought that same desire might be the key to getting through to Ty Lee, Suki now wondered if there truly was any way to get through to someone so very self-deluded. “Ty Lee, your friends can’t both be happy,” Suki told her gently. “Maybe they could have been, at one point, but that’s no longer an option.”

“It is,” Ty Lee insisted. “It… It has to be.”

They looked at each other in silence for several heartbeats, then Longshot said softly, “You’re severely overestimating Zuko’s self-preservation.”

Ty Lee scowled at him. “I realize he’s self-destructive – “

“I don’t think you do,” Longshot interrupted calmly. “He is actively self-destructive. He will actually kill himself before endangering any of us. That isn’t just my belief. It’s fact.” His words were stilted, as if spoken by someone who was forcing them out.

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because he’s made that choice before.”

“Sacrificing himself – “

“I don’t mean sacrificing himself.” Longshot’s voice gained an edge. “I mean actually killing himself. I mean that he actually tried to kill himself.”

Every single head in the cell turned sharply towards Longshot, including Suki’s. Ty Lee shook her head, looking a little lost. “You’re wrong.”

“I’m not,” Longshot disagreed. “He used to wear bandages on his left wrist under his sleeves. I asked about them once and he said they were a gift from a friend. I believed him then, but when he stopped wearing them, I saw the long scar across his wrist. I’ve seen it before. There’s only one way to get a scar like that.”

Suki felt sick. He had to be wrong. Maybe he was bluffing to psych Ty Lee out. Zuko would never have done that. Zuko wouldn't give up.

“…It doesn’t matter,” Ty Lee responded quietly. “This is how it has to be.”

“Even if it kills one of your friends?” Suki demanded.

“If he’s right,” Ty Lee said, voice shaking, without meeting anyone’s gaze, “if it comes to that, if I have to choose, I choose Azula. So it doesn’t matter.”

“Really? It doesn’t matter at all who’s right and who’s wrong?”

“I don’t care about right or wrong,” Ty Lee dismissed.

“I don’t believe that’s true,” Suki countered. “I don’t believe that for a second. You care. I know you do.”

Ty Lee’s shoulders slumped. “…Maybe. But not enough.” She shot upright suddenly. “Dai Li!” The Dai Li reentered the cell. “Muffle the prisoners again. This time, all of them.”

Jet jerked in alarm. “Wait!” Smellerbee yelled urgently.

“I don’t have time for this,” Ty Lee snapped, but she held a hand up regardless, pausing the Dai Li’s actions.

“You don’t have to muffle Longshot,” Smellerbee insisted. “Please. He won’t talk anymore. You don’t have to muffle him.”

Ty Lee looked towards Longshot for confirmation, but he had fallen silent once more, paler than Suki had ever seen him. She sighed. “Muffle the other three, then.” The Dai Li did as requested.

Suki could have cried in relief when three quick blasts of air knocked the Dai Li off of their feet. Aang! Toph shot into the room with three panels of metal and swiftly restrained each agent, pinning them to the ceiling. As she freed Suki, Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot from their gags and bindings, Zuko took Ty Lee by her wrists and pinned her to the wall.

No. Ty Lee wasn’t resisting. Something was wrong.

Ty Lee smiled, eerily similar to Azula for a moment. "Zuko," she said sweetly, "the Earth King has invited you to Lake Laogai."

Zuko froze.

"No," Aang whispered.

"What's going on?" Jet demanded.

"Zuko, you are not honored to accept," Toph shouted. "Zuko! Zuko, you are not - "

"I am honored to accept his invitation," Zuko replied monotonously, and released her.

"No, no, no!" Aang screamed. "ZUKO!"

Zuko turned on Aang with a ball of fire, and Aang - extinguished it?

"Did you just firebend?" Smellerbee demanded. "What is going on here?!"

Toph tore another metal panel from - from somewhere, Suki hadn't been looking - and lunged for Zuko, tackling him to the ground and wrapping him in it. "Conditioning," she gasped out while she bent earth around the metal to reinforce it and pin him down. "What Ty Lee said, it's a trigger phrase, it's how Long Feng kept citizens in line!"

"Are you kidding me?!" Jet snarled.

Suki looked around at the mention of Ty Lee. Zuko had distracted them long enough for her to escape completely. Cursing, Suki raced out of the room, calling over her shoulder, "Ty Lee's gone!" Without waiting for backup, she took off after the shadow she saw disappearing around the corner at the end of the hall. It was no good. After a few moments, Ty Lee was long gone.

She skidded to a halt and Smellerbee nearly ran into her. "Ty Lee?"

"Lost her," Suki panted. "Zuko?"

"He's lost his damn mind," Smellerbee snapped. Suki heard a note of fear beneath the younger girl's bitterness. "We gotta go back and help - !"

Too late. Behind them, Jet slammed unceremoniously into a wall, covered in ash. "Zuko, you've got to listen to me!" he roared, getting right back to his feet. "You have to fight this! We have to go take down your crazy sister!"

Zuko launched himself at Jet, who just barely managed to dodge. Toph slammed into Zuko from behind, shoved him into the wall, and pulled the metal from the wall around him. "You gotta help us save the Earth King!" she told him.

"We can't do this without you," Aang put in, dashing after them and coming to a stop behind Toph. "We need you. Zuko, I know you're in there - "

Zuko exploded the metal around him, snatched Aang by his tunic, and hurled him full-force at Jet, sending both of them into the ground at Suki's feet.

Toph stomped the ground and sent Zuko flying in the other direction, then rocketed towards Suki and the others with the earth propelling her. "It's no use," she said. "I can’t keep him restrained. What do we do?”

"Right now?" Jet grimaced at Zuko in the distance. "Run. Maybe, if we can lead him to the exit, we can just force him out with us - "

"It’s as good a plan as any,” Suki agreed.

They followed Aang towards the way he, Toph, and Zuko had come in, with Toph occasionally tearing huge chunks of rock and metal out of the walls and flinging them down the hall at Zuko as he gave chase. Suki was guiltily relieved that at least one of them had the stomach to actively fight him off.

Partway to the exit, unfortunately, a streak of blue fire cut them off, indicated Azula's arrival with Ty Lee and an overwhelming force of Dai Li. "I see Zuzu's done something right for once in his life," Azula mused. “Of course, he had to be brainwashed first, but better late than never, right?”

“We drove ourselves right into a trap,” Jet muttered resentfully.

“What were we supposed to do?” Smellerbee hissed. “Leave him?”

“Suki, I need you to cover me,” Aang murmured to her.

“Of course,” Suki replied, startled. “What - ?”

“There’s no time to explain.” In the middle of the Dai Li attacking, Aang suddenly dropped into a meditative position and earthbended a small tent around himself.

…Okay then. This still wasn’t the weirdest thing that had happened to her that day. This was fine.

Toph, the lone bender of their group, was now occupied by Azula and the Dai Li. “Longshot, Smellerbee, back Toph up,” Jet barked. “Suki – “

Suki gestured helplessly at Aang.

“Okay.” Jet nodded once, visibly steeling himself. “Okay. I’ve got Zuko.”

As it turned out, Suki had Azula, who made it her mission to get to Aang. Suki couldn’t tell how long she fought Azula off, minutes or hours, but at some point, Toph took a second to knock Azula several feet down the hall, and Suki had a brief reprieve. At the same time, Zuko caught Jet by both his wrists and slammed him into the wall, pinning him the same way he’d pinned Ty Lee earlier.

"What are you going to do, Zuko?" Jet challenged. "Are you going to burn me? Like your father burned you?"

For the first time, Zuko flinched.

"Did your mother die for you so you could kill your family?" Jet pressed harshly.

Zuko muttered something, his gaze growing unfocused. Suki was too far away to hear.

"No," Jet said, firmly but not unkindly. "You know that's not true. Look at me. We're family. Not Azula."

Zuko looked at Jet for a long, long time. It was then that the earth around Aang burst open, revealing an airbender with glowing tattoos. Suki's jaw dropped. Had he entered the Avatar State voluntarily?

It was Suki's fault, in the end. For just a second, she had left her guard open, staring slack-jawed at the Avatar. In that second, Azula knocked her flat on her back and pointed two fingers at him, her ever-present sneer twisting into a triumphant smirk until Zuko lunged forward and, by all appearances, caught the lightning in one hand and shot it out of the other, zapping the ceiling beyond them over the Dai Li. The metal cracked, and Toph earthbended Azula onto the other side before the ceiling shifted substantially, releasing a great downpour of earth and creating a substantial barrier between them and their foes.

Aang flickered out of the Avatar State, eyes blown wide with panic. "Zuko!"

"I'm fine!" Zuko asserted. "Go back!"

"I - I can't!"

"Aang, you have to!" Zuko urged him. "You have to let go!"

"I can't do that!"

Zuko took Aang by the shoulders. "You can. I know you can. You just did it, and you can do it again."

"Zuko...."

"No matter what happens, Aang, I need you to let go. Can you do that for me?"

"...Yes," Aang agreed, his face hardening.

"Okay. Meditate again. It sounds like we have some time before the Dai Li reach us."

Aang nodded and retreated a few steps, forming his box of earth once more. Zuko turned away, facing the cave-in with a steely glint in his gaze. Suki caught him by the arm. "Blue, you promised," she said, a horrible feeling in her gut.

Zuko nodded. "I know. I kept it. I'm here now, aren't I?"

"That's not good enough. I need you to stay here.”

“I’ll do my best, Suki,” Zuko vowed reluctantly. “For you and everyone else. But I won’t promise you more than that. Not here, not now.”

“Blueko, what are you planning?” Smellerbee asked warily.

“Someone has to distract Azula while Aang enters the Avatar State.” Zuko shrugged. “Who better than her own brother?”

“We are not using you as bait,” Jet snarled. “Absolutely not. Next idea?”

“No one knows her better than I do,” Zuko insisted. “None of you could get under her skin like I could. I redirected her lightning this time because she wasn’t expecting it. Next time she’ll be prepared for it. Azula is lethal when she’s focused. Someone needs to… I need to distract her.”

“What if we just… escape through there?” Suki blurted out, gesturing vaguely at the ceiling. “Toph could bend the metal and the earth, and Aang could waterbend us right out of here – “

“You saw how quickly this happened,” Zuko cut her off. He pointed at the cave-in, from which voices steadily grew louder likely in proportion to the thinning of the barrier from the other side. “If Toph did that, we would all risk getting buried alive. The only safe way out of this is with Aang’s Avatar State.”

“There has to be another way,” Suki insisted.

“I’ll be okay.” Zuko held her gaze. “I promise.”

“Blue – “

The barrier burst open. Zuko whirled around to face his sister, knocking a fireball to the side in the nick of time. “Is that the best you’ve got?” he taunted her. “Can’t hit me with fire, can’t hit me with lightning – remind me why Father keeps you around?”

“Some of us were loved by our parents, Zuzu,” Azula sneered, feinting to the right with a jab and slamming her ignited foot into his left side.

“Loved?” Zuko coughed. “Favored, maybe, but not loved. Father has only ever used you. Even you can’t be dumb enough to think otherwise.”

Suki lost track of him and Azula for a few moments, still focused on protecting Aang until he reached the Avatar State. Hurry up, she thought helplessly. Please, please, hurry. The next time she took a second to look for Zuko, he and Azula were far, far away from her, beyond the exit, shouting at each other more than they were fighting – Zuko had done exactly as he’d planned to.

“ – jealous of your strength? Azula, have you still not realized that you’re the weak one?”

“Enlighten me, Zuzu, how did you reach that conclusion?”

“You’re the one who gave in,” Zuko retorted. “Father hated me because I was strong enough to resist him. You weren’t. That’s the only reason he’s ever cared about you. So what will you do now, Azula? Hurt me like he hurt me? Like he hurt you and Mother? Will it make you feel better, to be exactly like him? Who’s next after me? Ty Lee?”

“Shut up,” Azula snarled, her composure cracking for a second.

“Suki!” Smellerbee hissed. Suki started, eyes landing on Aang. His earth prison was gone again, and the glow of the Avatar State had returned.

"You know Ty Lee only stays because she fears you, right?” Zuko mocked Azula, stepping closer to her. “You know she doesn’t love you?”

“Zuko!” Jet shouted, but Zuko only spared him an apologetic glance before continuing.

“She’ll leave you someday, just like Mother left Father. Will you kill her then?”

“Jet, we have to go,” Suki insisted. Damn you, Blue. Damn you for doing this to me a second time.

“But Zuko – “

“Zuko never meant to come with us, Jet!” Toph cried.

“I’m not leaving anyone behind!”

“You want to see me just like father?!” Azula shrieked at him. “Fine, then!” She jerked Zuko forward by the tunic, brought her hand to the right side of his face in a bright blue inferno –

“We have to leave, now!”

At Toph’s command, Suki tackled Jet as Longshot similarly tackled Smellerbee, and once the five of them were close enough to Aang, he blocked them in with a two quick motions, separating them from Zuko and their enemies with earthbending. With a third motion, he created an earth ceiling beneath the metallic one, essentially boxing himself in on a much larger scale than he had either time earlier. Then he pushed, and Suki felt the ground shift beneath her swiftly until Aang punched through the wall and revealed the shore beside Lake Laogai. They had escaped, and Zuko was still trapped with Azula, Ty Lee, and the Dai Li.

Everyone turned slowly to Aang as his tattoos dimmed. He knelt on the ground, head bowed.

“…Aang, we have to go,” Suki forced out. “We have to go save the Earth King.”

“…Zuko,” Aang uttered mournfully, distraught. He visibly gritted his teeth, and after a few heartbeats, lifted his head. “Okay,” he whispered. “And then we go back for Zuko.”

“And then we go back for Zuko,” Suki agreed.

They did save the Earth King, but Ba Sing Se had already fallen, and with it, their chances of saving Zuko.

“So you’re telling me you found a way to get to Zuko,” Jet uttered incredulously, “and you’re asking me to stay.”

“…Yes.”

“And in what universe did you think you could possibly get me to agree to that?!”

"You're a leader, Jet!"

"Wha - So are you! What is that supposed to mean?!"

"The Kyoshi Warriors were in place two centuries before I was ever born. They had rules, traditions. All I did was fill a role that had always been there. But you - you cobbled together your own force. You took dozens of young, stupid, reckless kids and molded them into a force to be reckoned with. And I need you to do it again." Suki met Jet's gaze. "We're still going forward with the attack during the eclipse. I need you to unite what's left of the Earth Kingdom against the Fire Nation, and with or without us, I need you to march on the day of black sun."

Jet shook his head, but the defiance on his face was giving way to reluctant understanding. "So who's going after Zuko? You guys?"

"Just me and Sokka."

"You're kidding. Just the two of you? Why aren't you bringing anyone else?"

"Aang still needs to practice his waterbending and his earthbending, and he needs Katara and Toph to do that. So it's just the two of us."

"I'm going too."

Both Suki and Jet started. "Smellerbee?! How long have you been listening?" Jet demanded.

"Long enough," Smellerbee dismissed. "There's no way I'm staking Blueko's life on just the two of you. No offense, Suki, but I still don't know you two that well, and Blueko's a Freedom Fighter now. There's going to be a Freedom Fighter on the mission to save him."

"Damn it, Smellerbee," Jet sighed, running a hand through his hair. "You're my second. I can't do this without you."

"Can't do this without him, either," Smellerbee replied, more gently than Suki had ever heard her speak. "I know you don't like this, the three of us splitting up. But it's not just the three of us anymore."

"I'll keep her safe, Jet," Suki vowed, resting a hand on his shoulder. "I will bring Smellerbee and Zuko back to us, whatever it takes. I promise I will."

Jet gave her a long look, then nodded decisively. "...Okay."

Chapter Text

I was a heavy heart to carry
My feet dragged across the ground
And he took me to the river
Where he slowly let me drown

Heavy in Your Arms by Florence + the Machine

Act III: The Prince

Chapter 14: Heavy Heart to Carry

The first few days after his banishment, Zuko had woken up panicked, hyperventilating as he willed his left eye to see once more. It took his mother about an hour to calm him down from the brink of a panic attack on the first day, and then a little less time each subsequent day. It was difficult, but he mostly reconciled himself to his half-blind fate. When his face had healed enough for the bandages to be removed, he and his mother both had been pleasantly surprised that he’d retained almost all of his vision in that eye, leading her to opine in her more wistful moments that perhaps Ozai had intentionally spared his sight. However, he’d grown so used to not seeing out of his left eye that even three years later, waking up on an unknown shore after watching Zhao drown, he had been so placid that he hadn’t even noticed his left eye was shut for several hours.

The morning after Lake Laogai was not like that.

“…Shh…. It’s okay, Zuko, you can go back to sleep…. I’ve got you…. I’m going to fix this….”

The words themselves passed easily through his fuzzy ears, mimicking his mother’s own platitudes from those early days. Even the voice, enemy though it was, did not trigger the reaction it ought to have in his half-awake state. The searing pain in his face, however, jolted him awake at once.

Someone screamed. Something was burning. Was it him?

“Did he hurt you?!”

“He’s asleep, Azula! He – I’m fine, okay? I’m fine!”

Zuko did not open his eyes. He already knew where he was and who was in the room with him. He knew there was no escaping the danger anymore. There was nothing relevant to be seen, so he didn’t need to open his eyes at all.

“Let me see your hand.”

“Azula, really – “

“Let me see your hand.”

“…Is that an order, Princess?”

There was silence. Then the cell door slammed shut like nonverbal punctuation, and Ty Lee exhaled. “…I need to be able to reach your face, Zuko, and you’ve pressed it into your arms. I don’t want to move your arms. I’d rather you move them yourself. You can keep your eyes closed.”

That… would be acceptable. Zuko rolled over, feeling vulnerable as he presented his mostly-bare face to the danger. He missed his mask.

“I’m going to change your bandages now, okay?”

“I don’t suppose you could change them a little more carefully this time,” Zuko remarked, his voice dryer than usual in more ways than one.

“…Uh, yes. Yes, I can do that,” Ty Lee replied sheepishly.

Zuko braced himself, but no amount of bracing could prepare him for Ty Lee’s hand on his right cheek. He didn’t burn her this time, but it was a near thing. Instead, he jerked upright, eyes flying wide open –

“No,” he said. “No, no – “

“Zuko,” Ty Lee interjected, sounding frightened. “Zuko, I need you to calm down – !”

He wanted to laugh at her. He might’ve, actually. He wasn’t quite sure. “Calm - my eye – “

She spoke reassuringly to him, but the words traveled through a clogged filter in his ear, retaining only their tone when they reached his brain. Soon even that faded, drowned out by the steady, reluctant beat of his heart. He could no more have burned her than he could have bent metal for the chill that spread swiftly from his lungs to his fingertips, numbing every nerve except the ones on the right side of his face. There was no distraction and no escape. The pain was alive, writhing on his face, consuming his senses, and swallowing him whole.

Hours later, she’d finished treating the burn. Zuko wasn’t sure when the… episode had ended. He wasn’t sure if it had ended at all, or if it ever would. He was having trouble thinking clearly and everything was a bit blurry. The reduced vision in his left eye had hardly been noticeable back when his right eye was perfectly fine, but the idea of relying on just his left eye was more terrifying than he felt capable of thinking about.

As she wrapped a fresh bandage around his head, Azula stormed into the cell. “Well? Has the prisoner been cared for yet?” she sneered at Ty Lee.

Ty Lee scowled at her hands as they worked. “Just a moment.”

Azula tapped her foot impatiently. Ty Lee took her time securing the bandage, causing Azula’s glare to intensify. Finally she finished and stood up. “About time,” Azula bit out. “Out of the way. It’s time for the interrogation.”

“What did I even fix him up for?” Ty Lee muttered under her breath.

Azula’s gaze sharpened. “I told you it was a waste of time, didn’t I? If you like, I can set those pretty white bandages on fire. I’m sure Zuzu and I would both enjoy that greatly.”

Ty Lee stiffened.

“Well?” Azula pressed when there was no answer.

Ty Lee inhaled shakily and exhaled a bit less shakily. “No, Princess Azula. I would prefer you didn’t.”

Azula shrugged. “Makes no difference to me, personally. I’ll just have to find a different way to hurt him.” As Azula neared him, Ty Lee took small, nervous steps backwards until her back was against the wall, her panicked gaze never once straying from Zuko’s face. Zuko, for his part, did his best to look Azula in the eye as steadily as he could with half of his gaze covered and the other half partially obscured by his scar. “Where is the Avatar?” she asked.

“I don’t know.”

Azula lit a flame in one hand. With the other, she seized his left wrist hard enough to bruise. “Where is the Avatar?”

“I don’t know.”

She pressed the flame into his forearm. Zuko hissed in pain, but otherwise maintained his composure. “Where is the Avatar?”

“I don’t know,” Zuko ground out through gritted teeth. Azula pulled her hand away and studied him for a few moments. She was either determining his sincerity or the best place to burn him next. Seconds later, the second phrase was proven true as she pressed a flame to the palm of his left hand. Ty Lee made a horrified noise that drowned out any noise he might have made.

Azula pulled her hand away again. “Where is the Avatar?”

Zuko made eye contact with Ty Lee. “You don’t need to be here,” he said.

“Don’t talk to her,” Azula snapped. “I asked you a question. I’m waiting for an answer.”

“I said I don’t know,” Zuko retorted. “Maybe when you ask a question, you should listen to the answer.”

“Maybe he really doesn’t know,” Ty Lee put forth.

“And if he did know?” Azula pointed out icily. “Would he tell me that he knew? Or would he claim not to know anyway?”

“I would probably be rubbing it in your face that I knew and would never tell you,” Zuko mused.

Azula actually paused at that, seeming to consider his words. “No. Before, you might have. Now, you’ve been… domesticated,” she spat. “You wouldn’t say more than you had to.”

Zuko didn’t have time to ponder the validity of her assessment. Her hand glowed bluer and brighter, and she clasped it tightly with his own hand. This time, the pain elicited a low groan. She held on longer than either time before, and when she finally let go, his heart was beating far too rapidly. “Where is the Avatar?” she asked nonchalantly.

Zuko met her gaze and held it, but he did not verbally acknowledge her. There was nothing to say that he hadn’t already said.

She continued alternatingly repeating the question and burning different parts of his body, at random by all appearances. Eventually she grew bored. “I’ll be back tomorrow, Zuzu,” she said with a careless wave of her hand, turning her back on him. “If I were you, I would think on where your friends might be and try to have an answer, but it’s no matter to me. This is hardly a chore.” She strode out of the cell, slowing briefly beside Ty Lee to give her an unreadable look before picking up speed once more.

“I’ll be right back,” Ty Lee promised, and then she left too. It wasn’t until her calloused hands were rubbing honey into his palm that he registered her return. “Zuko?”

“…Yeah?” he responded. The effort of verbalizing felt like a physical blow to his chest.

Ty Lee stopped, looking at him in concern. “You… didn’t hear any of that.”

“…No.”

She resumed her ministrations. “I said you should try to think of something you can tell Azula tomorrow. Not their location, but maybe something small that doesn’t mean anything. Something that won’t help her but sounds like it might.”

Zuko shook his head. “She’d know,” he stated resignedly. “It would just provoke her.”

Ty Lee clicked her tongue. “You don’t know that for sure,” she contended. “Besides, what do you have to lose?”

“Any ideas come to mind last night?” Azula purred as she sashayed towards him, Ty Lee close behind. He wondered why she was there for the torture. She could have just waited until Azula left and then brought the bandages and honey. She didn’t have to see the unpleasant parts.

“Nothing,” Zuko drawled in response. Ty Lee sighed softly.

“Really? Nothing?” Azula echoed in mock-disappointment. “Oh well. I suppose I’ll have to find some other way of jogging your memory.” She clamped a metal ring around his left arm between the bandages and his elbow. Then she set the bandages on fire.

“Azula!” Ty Lee yelped, jerking forward.

“Relax,” Azula said idly, her sharp eyes trained on the fire. “It won’t spread beyond the metal and his arm will self-extinguish soon enough if the bandages don’t first. Of course, I can extinguish it myself if he tells me where the Avatar is….”

Zuko, for his part, had his eyes and mouth tightly clenched shut, and could not have said whether or not he was audibly registering the pain. What he did know was that as soon as the fire had gone out, thankfully before his skin could begin to melt, the pain somehow doubled in intensity. Then he knew that he was making noise, but every time he tried to focus on not doing that, the pain snapped at him and stole his attention once more.

They were talking – arguing? He wanted to listen but could not reconcile the sounds they made with any language. Ty Lee approached, one hand grasping that same jar of honey, another already swathed in it and nearing his –

– Zuko returned to consciousness slowly. It took him a few moments to understand that he had lost consciousness at all, particularly because he wasn’t sure if he had fallen before or while passing out. The light had faded significantly, but he registered Ty Lee’s presence through the inappropriately merry tune she was humming. He intended to ask why she was there, but the question filtered through his haze of pain and confusion, and what came out was, “Wyuh?”

Ty Lee started. “Good, you’re awake.” She stood quickly and brushed off her pants. “I have tea here for you, but I didn’t want it to get cold while you slept and obviously you can’t heat it yourself since you’re not allowed to firebend, so – “

Zuko regarded her skeptically. “You waited all day for me to wake up so you could heat some tea for me?”

“…Yes.”

“Go home, Ty Lee.”

“I just want to….”

“I’m not your responsibility,” Zuko said tiredly, each word costing him energy like a mental or emotional push-up. “I’m not your friend. I’ve never been your friend. Azula will never stop ‘interrogating’ me and I will never want a life here in the Fire Nation under my father’s rule – or hers, for that matter. Whatever you think you’re accomplishing by watching me get tortured every day, you’re wrong. Give up, go home, and don’t come back.”

Ty Lee froze. Her expression was imperceptible in the shadows, with no way for him to detect whether she was accepting or rejecting his words. They were both still for several moments, encumbered by the crushing weight of the darkness and the silence. Then she left the cell. To his chagrin, she returned within seconds, wielding a tray that presumably held food and drink. She set it down, knelt before it, and after a few seconds of work with a pair of spark stones, the cell was brightened by a small flame in a metal bowl on the tray. He watched as she put a grated cover on the bowl and set a kettle atop the lid.

“Thanks,” Zuko scoffed dryly. “Now go home.”

“I can’t.”

“You’re the reason I’m in here,” Zuko decried. “Leaving seems like the least you can do.”

“No, I actually can’t,” Ty Lee rebutted. “I can’t leave you alone with the fire, and I’m not putting it out, so you’re stuck with me.”

“I don’t want you here,” Zuko maintained, stressing each word to the best of his ability.

“I don’t care,” Ty Lee shot back, mimicking his tone as she settled down beside the tray. “Eat something. The tea will be done soon, and you need to keep up your strength.”

Zuko wanted to hit her so, so badly, but he restrained himself. If he knew his friends, they were probably looking for him right that second. Regardless of how unlikely it was that they would find him, let alone succeed at getting to him, the best thing he could do for them was, as she’d said, keep up his strength by eating. Furthermore, hurting her would only get him hurt even worse, which would make his injuries an even bigger impediment to any rescue efforts.

Also, hurting Ty Lee was a bit like kicking a polar bear puppy. Though she could hold her own in a fight, Zuko had never seen Ty Lee behave deviously or sadistically or help Azula in a way that any random soldier couldn’t have, making it difficult to blame her for her part in Azula’s schemes.

Zuko obliged Ty Lee, eating his food with his right hand and jostling his left arm as minimally as possible. It certainly still hurt, but luckily he seemed to have escaped the worst of it through unconsciousness. He was not looking forward to Ty Lee changing the bandages.

Azula was absent the following day, leaving it blissfully monotonous excluding Ty Lee’s removal of old bandages and application of honey and new bandages. She filled him in on the various news in the Fire Nation, doggedly soldiering through his decidedly unfriendly silence. It made him think of Aang a little bit, except Aang would be freeing him and blasting their way out, not bringing him tea as if that made up for torture and incarceration.

On his fourth day of imprisonment, Azula returned with a blade and Ty Lee at her side. “Where is the Avatar?”

“I don’t know.”

She gripped Zuko’s throat and jerked him into the air. She did not have as easy a time lifting him as he would have expected, considering the ease with which Aang had that time Zhao had captured them both. Between living with Lee’s family and living in Ba Sing Se, he must have built up some kind of weight. He quickly got his feet under him to prevent her from inadvertently (or perhaps not so inadvertently) strangling him. Once he was standing, she released him in favor of taking his left wrist, sliding the blade smoothly under his bandages, and slicing them open so that they cascaded to the ground. She put her blade to his wrist –

“Azula,” Ty Lee interjected sharply, “that could kill him.”

Azula made a noise of discontent and flipped his arm, placing her blade against the back of his arm instead. “Where is the Avatar?”

“I don’t know.”

She pressed the blade lightly into his arm and swiftly drew it from his elbow to his hand, leaving a thin line of blood in its wake. “Where is the Avatar, Zuzu?”

“I don’t know.”

She dug the blade in deeper and drew it very slowly from his hand back up to his elbow. Blood was trickling down his arm now and dripping onto the bandages. “Where is the Avatar?”

“I don’t know.”

She pulled a small pouch out of her pocket and dipped the bloody blade into the pouch. When it resurfaced, it was covered in salt. Zuko’s stomach dropped, but he carefully maintained his composed veneer. “Are you sure?”

“Yep,” Zuko drawled.

The interrogation was shorter that day. As always, Azula left with her belongings, and Ty Lee remained with her bandages and honey. This time she had a needle and thread as well. She examined his wounds, briefly excused herself, and came back with a cup of water. “This is going to hurt,” she warned.

“You don’t say,” Zuko scoffed. “Just get it over with.”

Ty Lee held his wrist firmly in her hand. He allowed her to guide it lower and further out so that his arm was stretched out diagonally. Then he watched as she poured water over his wound, hissing at the pain despite having braced himself for it. She continued to rinse out the various wounds Azula had left on his body. “The good news is that saltwater actually – what’s the word? – accelerates the healing. Don’t tell Azula that, though. She’ll just come up with something more painful without a healing factor.”

“How do you know all of this?” Zuko questioned, more out of boredom than outright curiosity, while she set the water aside and dried off his wounds with the clean side of his old bandages.

“I’m rich, Zuko,” she said offhandedly. “I’ve got all the time and money in the world to learn whatever I like.”

“Obviously,” Zuko retorted, rolling his eyes. “Why do you know all of this?”

Ty Lee’s ministrations slowed, and her voice took on a slightly higher pitch. Quite a feat, for her. “I don’t know. I figured it would come in handy at some point. I mean, fixing up wounds is a pretty universal skill.”

“Sure,” Zuko agreed. “That makes sense. But that’s not the real reason you learned it.”

Ty Lee paused completely at that point. Zuko felt a brief surge of satisfaction at having called her bluff. “Why don’t we strike a deal?” she suggested. “An answer for an answer.”

The satisfaction vanished, chased away by a cold sense of dread. “I haven’t been lying to Azula,” he said cautiously. “I honestly don’t know anything that could help find the Avatar.”

“I don’t mean like that,” Ty Lee huffed. “I mean…, what have you been doing since you were banished? What’s your life been like?”

“Why do you want to know?”

“I’m just curious,” Ty Lee defended herself. “We were friends, once. Or something like that. I always wondered if you were still alive out there. Now I know you were, but I still don’t know how.”

Zuko shrugged. “I had two swords and a good teacher. That’s all anyone really needs.”

Ty Lee set down his old bandages and began stitching up his deeper cuts. “So you stole?”

“To start with.” Zuko debated whether or not to tell her about the Blue Spirit. He quickly decided that his alter ego should stay hidden; there was always a chance that Azula would go hunt down one of his old associates and use their safety as a bargaining chip. “After about nine months, I learned to pick up small jobs wherever I was traveling.”

Ty Lee hummed in response. “To answer your question, I learned all of this from the same person who taught me to block chi.”

That was… actually interesting. Now Zuko really was curious. “There’s someone else who can block chi?”

“Let me rephrase that. The same person taught me about chi. I invented my chi-blocking technique based on what they taught me.” She glanced up at him. “My turn. How did you end up living with the Avatar and his friends in Ba Sing Se?”

“I don’t know how much of that I can afford to tell you,” he told her dryly.

“Well, take your time and let me know whatever you can. Or I can ask you a new question.”

Zuko did take his time, mentally parsing through all of his experiences with his friends to determine whether a safe explanation existed and if it did, what it was. “I stumbled into his pet, lost and hurt in some cave in the Earth Kingdom. When I went to Ba Sing Se and found out he was there, I returned his pet.”

“The flying bison, right?” Ty Lee guessed.

“It’s my turn for a question,” Zuko digressed. “Why did you seek out someone to teach you about chi?”

Ty Lee paused to consider his question, moving on from stitches to honey application. “I wanted to be able to defend myself, mostly. My father always believed that knowing the enemy’s fighting style is the most efficient way to take them down. Chi is the root of all bending, so I figured understanding how chi worked would give me an advantage against any bender. Last question: how did you meet the Avatar? You must have met him before if you knew whose pet you found.”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Okay,” Ty Lee acquiesced simply. “I’ll think of another question for tomorrow then.”

“Where is Azula?” Zuko asked a couple days later when Ty Lee strode in alone.

Ty Lee shrugged and gestured vaguely to the outside world. “She’s off doing something for the Fire Nation. I think she’s in Ba Sing Se.”

“…So what are you doing here?”

“I got permission to be your guard for the duration of her trip,” she chirped.

“And why would you do that?” Zuko felt like banging his head against a wall.

“Because you can make tea now!” She set down a tray with a water-filled kettle, a grated cover, a small dish of tea leaves, and a metal bowl of kindling.

Several thoughts went through Zuko’s head as he surveyed the set of items. Ty Lee must know she wasn’t allowed to give a prisoner permission to firebend. He found it unlikely that she would stick her neck out for him to that degree, but he couldn’t rule it out. This could also be a trick from Azula to get him to firebend so that he could be duly punished for it, but whatever punishment she wanted to impose upon him, she could simply impose it anyway. He highly doubted anyone was checking on him any time soon to ensure that proper protocol was being carried out. That left the third possibility; that he had failed to think of the true circumstances due to his limited perspective of the situation. All things considered, there seemed to be no significant harm in obliging Ty Lee and indulging in a moment of sentimentality.

He sent a short stream of fire from his fingertips into the metal bowl, and the warmth from firebending spread from his fingertips all the way through his body. It reminded him of his first, very brief hiatus from firebending just after his mother’s death, when he was unused to concealing his identity. He had sworn then to never again cease bending for so long, but here he was again, his bending forbidden to him.

“Are you going to… put the tea leaves in…?” Ty Lee questioned gingerly. She nudged the dish towards him.

“I heat the water first.”

She hummed. After a few moments of silence, she said, “They’re ginseng, by the way. I wasn’t sure which type was your favorite, but I know ginseng was I- “ She broke off, eyes widening almost guiltily, but Zuko knew she had been about to say his uncle’s name. What he did not know was why she would have remembered something so trivial after all this time. “Well. Anyway, I thought you might prefer that to something else. If you tell me your favorite kind, I can try to bring that next time.”

“I don’t have a favorite,” Zuko grumbled. “I like making tea, not drinking it.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

Zuko shrugged at her.

“There must be some kind of tea that you drank at some point that tasted better than the rest,” Ty Le wheedled. “Come on. There’s gotta be something.”

Zuko sighed heavily. “If I answer this, it counts as your first question.”

“Deal!”

“Shortly after I left the Fire Nation, I drank tea made from the blossoms of a panda lily. It was exceptional.”

“A panda lily! That’s pretty unusual,” Ty Lee mused. “I didn’t think there were many volcanoes in the Earth Kingdom.”

“My turn,” Zuko grunted, pouring the ginseng leaves into the kettle. “Why do you remember Uncle Iroh’s favorite tea?”

Ty Lee looked away, her countenance dimming minutely. “Ginseng is my mother’s favorite, too. They used to drink it together when I came over, remember?”

Zuko hummed noncommittally rather than admit to not remembering.

“Okay, my turn. Did you ever – “

Heavy footsteps neared them, and Ty Lee quickly stood between the kettle and the cell door. “Hello, ma’am,” one of Zuko’s guards greeted her. “Just checking on you.”

“Oh! Thank you, but everything is fine here. I will certainly inform Princess Azula of your diligence though!” Ty Lee said, just a touch too fast.

The guard stepped to the side and looked past Ty Lee directly at the kettle. “Ah, you’re having tea?” he said.

“Yep!”

“I’ll need to see your spark stones, just to be sure – “

Ty Lee crossed her arms. “Just to be sure that… what? I didn’t let the prisoner firebend? I’m not an idiot, Zikim.”

“My apologies, ma’am. I assure you, I am by no means questioning your judgment. However, it is standard protocol for guards to double check spark stone possessions for all visitors to firebending prisoners. I hope you understand.”

“I understand that regardless of your intentions, you are indeed actively questioning my judgment,” Ty Lee sneered. “I am not a mere visitor here. I am his guard for the day.”

“Yes, ma’am. However, what with this being your very first time guarding a firebending prisoner, you would technically be considered a trainee guard, in which case it is still standard protocol to require visual spark stone confirmation.”

Ty Lee shifted from one foot to the other. “Well, you will simply have to make an exception today. I misplaced my spark stones on my way in this morning and made do with some kindling.”

“The kindling for prisoners is not large enough to be used to start fires,” Zikim said slowly.

“Right, well, that’s why I brought in two branches from the outside,” Ty Lee fibbed.

“That is not permitted. Ma’am, I’m afraid I must ask you to leave the cell and forfeit your guarding duties.” Zikim strode into the cell and snuffed out the fire as he continued, “If you resist, I will have to inform the princess.”

Ty Lee deflated. “Fine.” She left his cell. “Zuko, I’ll… I’ll see you soon, I guess.”

Zuko didn’t answer her at first, but when she turned back to look at him, he gave in and responded lowly, “Yeah. See you soon.”

Zuko did not see her again throughout Azula’s absence, during which another guard provided a bowl of clean water and fresh bandages. Whether that was a small mercy on their part or instructions from a superior, he had no way of knowing. He did his best to clean and rebandage his wounds on his own, but there were few enough bandages that some old ones had to be reused, and there was nothing at all in the way of anti-infection ointment. When Ty Lee finally did reappear, it was at Azula’s heel as usual, with a fresh bruise on her face. Something deep in his gut twisted at the sight, but there was nothing to be gained from commenting on it, least of all with the most likely culprit there in the room with them.

“Did you miss me, Zuzu?” Azula crooned, hands already burning. “Are you ready to cooperate yet?”

“You’re a bastard, and I’m not telling you anything.”

Azula tutted at him. “Oh, well. I suppose your burns were too close to healing anyway. Time to… freshen them, hm?” She began her typical process of burning his extremities, with intermittent inquiries into the information he held back. After a while, she cast her piercing gaze to his left eye. At the sensation of fingernails lightly tracing his left temple, he flinched more violently than he would have ever wanted to in front of Azula. She smirked cruelly at him as his heart pummeled his ribs unforgivingly. “You know, this wound in particular has been given an awful lot of time to heal. It wouldn’t do to neglect it.”

Zuko did not speak, but his lungs twisted in his chest, and a subdued but distressed noise tore out of his throat. Azula’s eyes widened, gleaming with anticipation, and her smirk stretched across her face. If she had been nearing boredom before, now, like a tiger shark smelling blood, she had been rejuvenated by the show of weakness. “I’m sorry, Zuzu, was that a ‘yes’ or a ‘no?’” She tilted her head, frowning in mock concern.

The room spun as his brain shot out possible responses rapid-fire. All of the answers held the potential of further inciting her bloodlust. He didn’t know what to say. He just knew that he had to make her stop.

“What do you think, Ty Lee?” she tossed over her shoulder at her uncharacteristically meek companion. “Was that a ‘yes’ or a ‘no?’”

Ty Lee looked frantically between him and Azula. “A – A ‘no?’”

Azula clicked her tongue and hummed. “I don’t know, I rather think it was a ‘yes.’ And as the accommodating host I am, I ought to oblige him. Wouldn’t you agree?”

“No, I wouldn’t,” Ty Lee said breathlessly. “I wouldn’t agree. I don’t agree.”

Azula observed them both for a few seconds, as if there were a chance she would decide not to burn his face again after all. There had to be something he could say – some weakness of hers that he could exploit, or something he could offer her –

He could –

He couldn’t.

He could… take Ty Lee’s advice, offer her some morsel of –

No, he couldn’t. He couldn’t do that.

“That’s quite a shame,” Azula denounced. The air beside his left ear grew warmer and louder with crackling of flames, and his heart thumped, it thrashed like a dying animal. His right arm jerked forward of its own accord, right into Azula’s waiting, open palm. She slammed his wrist into the wall behind him. His fingers grew numb, and his face grew warmer and warmer, and all the while his heart diligently beat itself to death against his constricted chest –

The time he spent unconscious was indeterminable, but it couldn’t have been too long, because Azula’s shadow covered him still when he came to. She made some sort of sounds, but the precise translation of those sounds was and would forever remain unknown to Zuko. She made no further noise, and her shadow distanced itself from him until it left his field of vision. Then there were more sounds. They were to his left. Slowly, he twisted his neck to the left and tilted his head, aiming his eye at Ty Lee, who remained in his cell. What had she said? Zu… Zu…ko. Which was… his name. Right.

“Yes,” he answered, or asked, or confirmed.

Ty Lee visibly swallowed. “I have to treat that,” she revealed reluctantly, pointing at his face.

No, he wanted to say, or, in lieu of that, Could you knock me out first? or at the very least, Could you do me a favor and murder me instead? He did not say any of those things, or anything at all, opting instead for the response that required the least effort: a nod.

Ty Lee briefly left the cell and returned with her usual array of supplies on a tray beside two bowls, only one of which was out of the ordinary. First she soaked the cloth in water from one bowl. Then she set the cloth on the tray, scooped some ice from the second bowl, and wrapped the cloth around it. “This might help,” she advised hopefully, keeping the cloth within sight of his eye for as long as she could as she drew it closer to his left cheekbone. When it did, the cold did little to offset the pain of phantom heat enveloping his face, but ‘little’ was better than nothing. He could hear her talking as she treated his newest wound, but he did not care to listen, and she evidently got the picture for she ceased talking soon enough.

At some point after she had moved on from his face to other wounds, Zuko noticed for the first time that her face was bruised. “Have you done something with that yet?” he asked gruffly, gesturing.

“Yes,” she quietly replied. “I put some ice on it last night and this morning, and I applied pineapple cream as well.”

“Pineapple cream,” Zuko echoed dubiously.

Ty Lee snickered. “I know it sounds funny, but it really does help.”

“How did it happen?” he asked warily.

She hesitated. “…It’s my turn to ask a question, isn’t it?”

He rolled his eyes, but indulged her all the same. “Go ahead.”

“…Why won’t you just tell her something?” she pressed. “Not something important. Just the bare minimum.”

“She’ll see right through me,” Zuko dismissed.

“But you could at least try – “

“I’ve spent my whole life ‘at least trying,’” Zuko sneered at her. “I ‘at least tried’ to catch the Avatar, more than once. I ‘at least tried’ to stop Zhao from killing the moon spirit in the North Pole. I ‘at least tried’ to make a life for myself in that village in the plains and again in Ba Sing Se. All of that trying got me nowhere.”

“I don’t believe that,” Ty Lee countered. “And I don’t believe that you believe that. I know you helped people out there. Maybe you don’t even realize it, but I know you did. That’s who you are.” She rubbed her palms together, a pensive look on her face. “…If you hadn’t been in Ba Sing Se to stall Azula, she would have caught the Avatar for sure.”

“Or she would never have stood a chance to begin with because I wouldn’t have been brainwashed, because I wouldn’t have been there,” Zuko retorted.

“You don’t know that for sure.”

“Neither do you!”

Ty Lee huffed at him. “Okay, well, if you hadn’t been at the North Pole to fight Zhao, even if you didn’t save the moon spirit, I bet you saved other people by distracting him.”

“Aang was there in his Avatar State. I was the one who needed saving.”

“Didn’t you save him from Zhao and the Yuyan Archers?”

So they do know that I was the Blue Spirit. One of the people who had been involved in the war effort in Ba Sing Se must have let it slip without realizing it might have been to his detriment. “I’m the reason he was there to begin with.” Zuko snorted. “Wow. I think I actually feel worse now than I did before you started talking.”

Ty Lee did not respond, but her jaw tightened, and she worked in silence for the remainder of her time with him. Another day Zuko might feel bad, despite the fact that he was the one in the cell with no foreseeable future outside of said cell. Today, he was just exhausted enough to feel, rightfully and deservedly so, relieved that she was yapping at him.

As she left that day, she said quietly, “Will you think about it? Please?”

Zuko didn’t answer.

Looking defeated, Ty Lee despondently shuffled away.

“Today is an exciting day, brother.” Azula brandished a long, unusually shaped blade. “I have a new weapon with me. I’m very excited to familiarize you with it…, assuming you are still refusing to tell me anything useful.”

Over Azula’s shoulder, Ty Lee’s eyes sought his out, wide and pleading. Zuko met them, straightening his back as his resolve hardened. Her shoulders slumped.

“Your loss, my gain,” Azula taunted. She strode forward, blade in hand –

“Just tell her something,” Ty Lee blurted out.

Azula rolled her eyes, exhaling loudly. “I’m about to enjoy myself, Ty Lee,” she pointed out, a note of warning in her voice. “Don’t ruin this for me.”

“Anything,” Ty Lee insisted, disregarding Azula entirely. “There has to be something – “

“I said don’t ruin this for me,” Azula barked, turning. “Or do I have to have… words with you?” Her gaze drifted towards the bluish purple patch on Ty Lee’s face.

Ty Lee looked desperately between Azula and Zuko, she opened her mouth to object once more, and his resolve snapped in half like a thin, brittle branch. “Wait,” he sighed heavily, drawing Azula’s attention back to him. “…I don’t… know precisely where they are, but… I could answer a question or two. Maybe. Depending on what it is you want to know.”

Azula tilted her head. “Strengths, weaknesses, ulterior motives, relationship dynamics…. Why don’t you start by telling me what you know about the Avatar State?”

Zuko mentally parsed through everything he knew to determine what was safe to confess. “Not much more than what we learned at the royal academies. It enhances his bending abilities in all four elements. It also seems to enhance physical abilities like strength, speed, and agility, but that could just be a by-product of his enhanced airbending ability.”

“Why doesn’t he use the Avatar State in every fight, if it makes him so powerful?”

He was loathe to tell her just how recently Aang had mastered the Avatar State, but he could tell her something small, like, “It takes some energy out of him, so that might be the reason, or at least part of the reason. I don’t know for sure. I haven’t really asked him about it.”

“Really?” Azula questioned skeptically. “Your friend can channel an ancient spirit, transform into a monolithic mass of water, and slaughter dozens of Fire Nation soldiers in one swipe of his colossal arms, and you don’t even question him about the experience?”

“…Pretty much, yeah.”

Azula sighed heavily. “You should find great shame in the fact that I actually believe that of you. You always were simple-minded.” She tapped her chin thoughtfully. “Hmm…. What else shall I ask you…?”

Zuko shook his head. “No. I’m not telling you any more today.”

Azula scoffed at him. “You’ve barely told you anything.”

“I’ve told you enough. Come back tomorrow if you need to ask me anything else.”

“I don’t think you understand how this works,” Azula derided. “You are a prisoner, and I am a captor. This is not a negotiation. If you answer each and every one of my questions to my satisfaction, then and only then will I consider ceasing these interrogations.”

“If you don’t leave now, I won’t answer a single question ever again,” Zuko shot back.

Azula rolled here eyes. “Oh, how terrible. You mean I’d get to torture you mercilessly whenever I liked, which I have been greatly enjoying this past week and a half? How awful for me.”

“You can always do that after you’ve milked all the answers you can out of him,” Ty Lee put in mildly.

“No, by then I may as well have him rehabilitated,” Azula rejected, dismissively waving her hand at Ty Lee. This was news to Zuko, who had sort of assumed he would be killed or left alone if he were to tell Azula everything. Perhaps he could… fake it? Pretend to tell her everything he knew while hiding any essential information, act his way through rehabilitation, maybe even become an inside informant for his friends? That would take months, if not years. He really, really hoped that his father would be dead by the time he saw any profit from such a plan, but… he could keep it in mind. Just in case. “Oh, very well. As a show of good faith, I’ll let you be tonight. You better have more than that for me tomorrow. Ty Lee, go ahead and… fix him up, or whatever it is you do.” She left them.

“Thank you,” Ty Lee said, beaming at him.

“I didn’t do it for you,” Zuko replied acerbically.

“I know, but I’m grateful anyway.”

It was probably not right to resent someone for expressing gratitude, but societal norms had never stopped Zuko from resenting someone before and they certainly didn’t now.

Ty Lee set about cleaning wounds and replacing bandages in various places on his body. “I’m pretty sure it’s your turn to ask a question, if you have one,” she cajoled, entirely too cheerful. If she reacted with such violent jubilance every time he obliged her, he would have to question any future decisions to do so.

Disregarding his current line of thought, Zuko considered her for a few moments as he contemplated potential questions. If he asked the right one, it might knock her down to a more tolerable mood. “Why are you so loyal to Azula?”

His attempt was unsuccessful. If possible, Ty Lee’s smile grew. “Because she’s my friend! And Mai’s my friend, and she’s loyal to Azula too…, and you’re my friend, and the only way to see you is through Azula. So there’s really no reason not to be.”

“Haven’t you ever thought about, I don’t know, the morality of what you do by following her?” Zuko queried. “And I’m not talking about what happened in Ba Sing Se. I’m talking about…, y’know, in general. She’s a terrible human being, and she does terrible things to lots of people who don’t deserve it. Doesn’t any of that give you pause?”

“It’s my turn!” Ty Lee chirped right over him, ignoring him with an admirable level of ease. “There’s this one plant I made tea out of once and it was so good, but I can’t remember where it was. I know it was at one of the Air Temples though. I was hoping you could help me figure out which one.”

“Uh…, sure?” Zuko replied once the silence made it clear that she was looking for an answer. “I mean, it’s your turn, so….”

“Great!” She pulled out a drawing of a flower that… was actually familiar to him, to his surprise. “This is the White Lotus. Have you seen it?”

“Yeah, I’ve seen it,” Zuko confirmed.

“Which Air Temple was it at?”

“Uh…. I know the Eastern Air Temple has that.”

Ty Lee groaned. “Seriously? That’s the one that’s the farthest from here…. Are you sure none of the others do, too?”

“Well, they might. I don’t know for sure if the others do or not.”

Ty Lee hummed. “Maybe I’ll check them out anyway, just to be safe…. Okay, anyway, it’s your turn. What was your question?”

“Do you ever think about doing the right thing instead of taking Azula’s side by default because it’s more convenient for you?”

Ty Lee’s face fell a bit, at that, which Zuko counted as a win. “I don’t know…. Azula’s methods may seem pretty awful, but she gets the job done, right? And what the Fire Nation’s doing isn’t completely awful. The Fire Nation is way more prosperous than the Earth Kingdom, and our people are more connected. I don’t think it would be some terrible tragedy if the Earth Kingdom became more like us.”

Zuko recoiled. “It might have seemed that way, when we were kids, but you’ve seen the Earth Kingdom for yourself now. You can’t possibly believe that the Fire Nation is doing more good than harm out there.”

“Maybe not right this second, but in the long run, the Earth Kingdom will be better off,” Ty Lee opined.

“Yeah, and before that happens, how many lives is the Fire Nation going to take? How many lives will they ruin? Besides, has it ever occurred to you that the Earth Kingdom is doing so badly because of the war?”

Ty Lee stood so swiftly that her supplies clattered to the ground. “I’ll send a guard in to finish,” she blurted out, and exited so abruptly that Zuko didn’t have time to ask why.

Zuko was convinced that he had pushed too far with his questions and driven Ty Lee away, possibly permanently. This theory was further solidified by the fact that she stayed away the next day too, although Azula did as well. When Azula joined him the day after, Ty Lee was nowhere to be seen, but the gleeful smirk on Azula’s face told him that wherever Ty Lee was, Azula was likely happy about it.

“Hello, brother.”

“No knives today?” Zuko remarked. “Just fire? Careful, Azula. I might get bored.”

Azula laughed, practically giddy. He might have been frightened if he had the energy for it. “Oh, Zuzu. Simple, naïve Zuzu…. Aren’t you going to ask me where Ty Lee is?”

Zuko’s blood ran cold.

“Go on, Zuko. Ask me where she is.”

“What did you do to her?” he growled.

“What did I do to her?” Azula’s eyes flashed with rage, and she swiftly backhanded him with enough force to send him sprawling onto his stomach, thankfully on the side of his face that had been burned less recently. “Let me make this clear. I would never hurt Ty Lee.” He pushed himself up so his weight was on his hands and knees. She stepped closer, leaned over him, took a fistful of his shirt, and jerked his torso into an upright position. “You thought you were so clever back in Ba Sing Se. You thought you had outwitted me and uncovered all of my weaknesses,” she spat, “but all you did was reveal your own to me.” She released him and took a step backwards, grinning slyly at him. “Ask me where she is.”

Zuko stayed silent. They stared each other down for a few moments. She had only invited him to ask because she was dying to tell him, and he would absolutely not gratify her by asking regardless of whether or not he wanted the answer.

After a few moments, she narrowed her eyes. “Ty Lee has gone to seek the Avatar and his friends, brother, based on all the information you have so kindly provided her.” Zuko’s first instinct was to deny having given any information, but he hesitated, and Azula pressed onwards. “First she’s going to make a little stop at that village outside of Mt. Makapu. You know, Mt. Makapu, the first volcano you might encounter just after leaving the Fire Nation? Then, there’s this village in the plains where you apparently spent more time than I realized, so she’ll stop there too. Finally, she’s going to end her trip at the Eastern Air Temple, which you visited for long enough that you recognized a flower from a simple drawing.” She cocked her head to the side. “Do you understand yet, Zuzu?”

At once, a mindless, violent fury engulfed him, just as piercing as it had been the day he discovered the truth behind his mother’s murder. He could not believe Ty Lee had done this to him – could not believe that, while actively refusing to trust her, he had somehow still trusted her to the degree at which she even could do this to him. The stab of betrayal came from both Ty Lee and his own weakness, the naivety he’d thought dead long ago. What stung the most was perhaps the sheer misfortune of it all; he had scarcely said anything at all to Ty Lee, could easily have mentioned three completely irrelevant locations to her, and yet two of the three places were two of the most significant places in his life. And he had handed them to the Fire Nation on a silver platter.

If Azula’s expression was anything to go by, his emotions were evident upon his face, and she gloried in them. “I still can’t believe you thought that I would hit her just for letting you set a few twigs on fire,” she scoffed. “Or that I would threaten to do so directly in front of you, a prisoner. Or that a mere guard would question her actions – truthfully, Zuzu, I could go on and on….” She sighed wistfully. “I would have loved to have drawn out this charade for a few more weeks and seen just how much faith you could be persuaded to place in Ty Lee, but unfortunately, I have an Avatar to catch and a war to win. Still, this has been enjoyable enough.” She crouched before him and looked him in the eye, gaze twinkling with malevolent mirth. “Would you like to know whose idea it was?”

“I have nothing to say to you,” he heard himself utter in an emptier voice than he’d known he possessed.

“Very well,” Azula replied amicably, rising once more. “You won’t be seeing me again, I’m afraid. I have better things to do than interrogate someone who doesn’t know anything of value. But the guards will keep you fed and watered for whatever remains of your life. So long, Zuko.”

”I know a survivor when I see one.”

It was everywhere. Where was it coming from? He looked over himself, but all of his wounds were faded, hardly distinct from his skin. Still, the metallic stench congested the air, and he choked on it. The tide rose steadily until he was practically swimming in it.

Toph floated towards him, lounging across the surface of the scarlet expanse, drenched in scarlet moonlight. “You, Zuko, are a survivor.”

“-one’s here to stitch you up,” the guard called, lightly rattling his cell door. “And change your bandages, and all that.”

Zuko opened his eyes, more tired than he had been before he’d gone to sleep the night before. He grunted out acknowledgement and slowly sat upright. His right hand instinctively grasped at his left wrist. He had not seen it bleed in his dream – had in fact seen that it was distinctly not bleeding – yet he felt so sure that it had been bleeding.

“Hello,” Mai said in a bored voice.

Zuko looked up, startled. “…Why are you here?”

Mai shrugged, indifferent to his bluntness. “Azula figured that you would probably die of infection if no one took care of all your injuries, and it’s illegal to let prisoners die – plus, Ty Lee probably wouldn’t be thrilled – but she also didn’t think any of the guards were competent enough to do it, so…., here I am.” She unenthusiastically gestured at herself. Her characteristic flatness and monotony was almost comfortingly familiar, shaken by neither the years since they’d last spoken nor the strange and uncomfortable circumstances under which they were reuniting.

“Thanks, I guess,” he offered dryly.

“You’re welcome, I guess.”

Mai did not attempt to engage him in conversation, which was a pleasant change of pace. They sat in nearly companionable silence as they worked, her carefully unwrapping each bandage while he cleaned off each uncovered wound in her wake. Once all his wounds had been cleaned and rebandaged, she called for a guard who brought him a kettle of panda lily tea that had been heated outside of the cell. “Ty Lee ordered a shipment of panda lily blossoms for your tea,” Mai explained. “I can only assume it’s her idea of an apology.”

Zuko poured himself a cup and took a sip, trying not to think about Ty Lee hunting down everyone he cared about.

Mai’s behavior that day proved to be the rule, not the exception. With Azula’s absence, Mai’s occasional silent company, and the deceptively placid ambience of his cell, Zuko dared to imagine himself enduring the mind-numbing boredom and restlessness long enough to see his friends win the war and free him. Unfortunately, as all good, okay, or even tolerable things in his life were wont to do, this atmosphere met an abrupt and unpleasant end at Azula’s hands after a couple of weeks.

“What did you do?” Azula growled lowly, slamming the cell door shut behind her.

“…I am literally locked in a cell twenty-four hours - “

Azula spun sharply. “Guards, leave.”

The two guards exchanged apprehensive glances. Whether out of sentiment towards Zuko or a misguided sense of duty, they hesitated, but then took faltering steps away from his cell. Alarmed, Zuko swiftly stood.

“Where is she?”

Zuko raised an eyebrow.

“Where is she?!” Azula thundered, her fingertips crackling with blue fire.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Azula swept a torrent of flames at him with her right foot that he easily bended away with one hand and shoved him against the wall. “Where is Ty Lee?”

“What?” Zuko exclaimed incredulously. “What do you mean, ‘where is she?’ You’re the one who told me where she was going to begin with!” She snarled wordlessly at him and pulled him forward just to slam him into the wall again. Frustrated, he knocked her wrists aside with his left forearm and punched fire at her with his right hand, driving her a few steps backwards. “Azula, I have no idea what you’re talking about!”

“Don’t lie to me!” She blasted him with both hands. As he dispelled the flames with his own, she lunged forward, hands ablaze, and smashed both of his wrists into the wall. Dryly, he thought, There goes all the healing progress. “You tricked her. You sent her into a trap!”

“How could I have done that?!” Zuko burst out. “I had no idea what she was planning!”

Azula hurled him into the corner of the cell and stormed out. “When I find her,” she sneered over her shoulder, “I’ll be back for you, Zuko.” As she walked out of sight, her fading footsteps were drowned out by her command: “Guards! The prisoner attacked me. See to it that he is chained up until tomorrow.”

Zuko groaned frustratedly and let his head thunk against the wall beside him.

The following morning, he awoke unchained, aching profoundly in all of his joints. “I hope she doesn’t find her,” he grumbled spitefully under his breath, rolling his shoulders and stretching his arms out until his elbows popped. Absently, he wondered why Mai hadn’t shown yesterday before determining that she had probably been busy or else ordered away by Azula until he had a suitable answer for her. There was food and water waiting for him on a tray as usual. He ate as much of it as he could stomach, which was very little, and then he stared blankly at the remaining food on the tray. By all appearances, the food was without eyes, yet he felt its challenging gaze all the same. He was going to eat it. Probably. Aang would give him so much grief if he withered down to nothing in the prison cell.

Aang wasn’t going to see him again.

…Aang might see him again. Maybe. But probably not. Zuko didn’t doubt that his friends would come for him, or at least try to. Mostly, he doubted that they would even come close to succeeding. Suki and Jet would be the first to recognize that despite their attachment to him and sheer willpower, their mission was doomed. They were also, conveniently, most qualified to convince the others to turn back.

Still, it wouldn’t do to let his poor appetite get the better of him now, however little he desired food. He had underestimated his friends before. He may as well give them the benefit of the doubt now. If I let this happen, he thought fiercely, if I let myself die here in this prison cell, then why was I ever alive at all?

That night, as he was settling down to sleep, a guard named Shekon approached his cell. He was younger than most of Zuko’s guards and generally seemed a nervous guy, but especially so on this night. “I’m very sorry about this, but I’m afraid I have to ask you to sit upright, sir. The princess has decreed that you are not to sleep until she returns with Ty Lee.”

“…What?” Zuko said in disbelief. “How does she plan to prevent me from sleeping? Even chained up, I would still fall asleep eventually.”

Shekon timidly presented Zuko with a pair of cymbals.

“This has got to be a joke.”

After several hours of infrequent clashing from outside his cell every time he began to drift off, Zuko was finally forced to conclude that this was not, in fact, a joke. This conclusion had no bearing on his internal discussion of whether or not his entire life was a cosmic joke being played on him by the universe; that debate was yet to be resolved.

The first full day of sleeplessness hardly weighed on him at all. Between overnight stakeouts as a bounty hunter and living on the run before and after his bounty hunter career, he was no stranger to periods of wakefulness lasting thirty-six hours or longer. As he sat leaning against the wall on the second night, careful not to let himself relax too much for fear of provoking the counterfeit musician outside, he began to feel truly sleepy for the first time.

Unfortunately, thanks to the lack of available food and water, he knew that the effects of sleep deprivation were going to hit him harder and faster than it had for years. However, he did expect to last a little bit longer than he did, which was only a few more hours. Perhaps his time imprisoned had weakened him further than he’d thought, or perhaps it was the monotony of his miserable existence that did him in, but the cymbals smashed against each other much more that night than they had the night before.

As the sun ascended on the third day, Zuko tensed his muscles and counted to five, then pushed, his hands flattened against the ground to support him. Nothing happened. He took a deep breath and tried again to no avail. Frustrated, he relaxed for a few moments. It was a mistake. His eyes slid shut, and his ears exploded in a cacophony of horrible, discordant notes. He jolted upright, and immediately used the momentum to propel him all the way to his feet. That had been his goal anyway, so perhaps relaxing hadn’t been a mistake after all, though whether it was worth that terrible sound was dubious. Nonetheless, now that he was standing, he felt much more awake. He set about pacing the perimeter of his cell.

The constant activity warded off sleep for a while, but towards the afternoon he began to struggle again, his feet and eyelids weighed down by the call of unconsciousness. He was certain that no stone floor had ever looked as comfortable nor as welcoming as the floor of his cell. As the sun commenced its descent, he reluctantly allowed himself to sit. The motion was not dissimilar from falling. The guard on duty, Taa, was eyeing him warily now, so Zuko straightened his back, lifted his head, and widened his eyes to look more alert. Taa did not look away. Rather, she widened her eyes back at him, alarmed. It occurred to Zuko that he might appear more deranged than alert, and then it occurred to him that deranged was still better than sleepy, so he did not alter anything until she looked away.

Once her eyes were off of him, he felt his resolve weaken. Agni, he did not want those cymbals to be wielded against him again, but he was pushing… something like forty-eight hours now, right? Or maybe seventy-two hours? Too many hours. Definitely enough to be setting a personal record. He wanted to go to sleep. He needed to go to sleep. I can’t -

He shot back onto his feet. He had already forgotten how he had planned on finishing that thought, but it didn’t matter. Whatever it was, he absolutely could. He resumed his pacing with renewed vigor. Another guard brought him his dinner soon, and he picked it up so he could eat it while standing rather than risk falling asleep mid-chew as he had during breakfast. “If I die in this cell, then nothing I ever did meant anything,” Zuko told the unappealing food on his tray. But that might be true anyway. Zuko ignored that thought because that thought was not going to help him force food down his throat.

When he looked up from his meal, Smellerbee was hanging out on the opposite side of his cell. “What’s up, Blueko?” she greeted him casually. “Spirits, you look like shit.”

“…What?” he said dumbly.

She peered worriedly at him. “Are you feeling okay? I think you need to get some sleep. I can take next watch.”

“Next… watch? What are we watching?”

“Definitely not that puppet show Sokka put in the agenda.” She laughed. “I can’t believe that guy thought anyone would go for that. I can’t believe Longshot did go for that!”

“That doesn’t have anything to do with what I just asked you,” Zuko objected, utterly confused.

“Uh… Excuse me? Prisoner?”

Zuko looked up at Taa. “Yes?”

“You’re talking to yourself.”

Zuko blinked at her a few times. Then he gave Smellerbee a long, thoughtful look, and then he turned back to Taa. “Yeah, you should probably just get used to that until those cymbals are gone.”

“That’s fair,” Taa mused. “Guess I’ll warn the rest of the guards.”

“That’s a good idea,” Smellerbee advised her. “You wouldn’t want them to be caught off-guard.” Her voice was coming from behind him, which was strange since she had been across from him before.

He turned around to look for her, but she didn’t seem to be in the cell anymore. “Hey, uh… pal? You there still?” He carefully did not say her name, just in case Azula and Ty Lee didn’t know it yet. Smellerbee did not answer, which was probably good, but he still didn’t like it.

As the cymbals assaulted his mind in the hours before the fourth day’s dawn, Zuko allowed himself to sit down again out of necessity, but Sokka showed up to keep him company. “Did I ever thank you for saving Katara?” he asked.

“When did that happen?”

“Oh, well, I was referring to the North Pole in particular,” Sokka elaborated. “Remember, when she attacked Zhao without her waterbending and you shoved her out of the way? You took a fireball for her. And that was right after you saved her by throwing your uncle’s knife at Zhao. I mean, you had to know that you might not recover it. It’s pretty lucky that I was able to.”

Zuko hummed in acknowledgement.

“Come to think of it, you saved her from that sickness too, didn’t you? You know, when she and I woke up sucking on frozen toads?” Sokka wrinkled his nose. “Ugh. Disgusting. But, actually, you saved both of us then. And you got my boomerang back.”

“You already thanked me for that,” Zuko pointed out.

“Uh, did I say I was thanking you just now? Geez, Zuko. I thought you were a firebender, but maybe you’re an egobender.”

Zuko rolled his eyes. “Uh-huh.”

“I’m just saying you’ve helped us through a lot of crazy stuff. Hey, who knows if we would have been able to take down the drill at Ba Sing Se without you either? Or that jerk Long Feng. And I bet we never would have found Appa.”

“I hear you, Sokka,” Zuko said tiredly. “I appreciate the – “ He reached up to pat Sokka’s shoulder, but his hand went right through, and Sokka soundlessly popped out of existence. That was okay. Zuko wasn’t sure what word he had been about to say next, and it would have been embarrassing to fumble his words like that. Sokka would never have let him live it down.

While he ate breakfast later on, he felt more than he saw Longshot materialize in his cell. The silent presence was welcome while Zuko was not quite up for conversation. As Zuko finished his meal, Longshot stared intensely at him for a long, long time. Finally, he opened his mouth, inhaled shortly as if to speak –

SMASH!

There was a split second where Longshot appeared shocked by the sudden noise, and then he was gone. Zuko, for his part, jumped out of his skin. “Wha – But – I didn’t – “ He scowled fiercely at Zikim, the offender, still wielding his weapons. “I wasn’t sleeping just now!”

“Yes, you were.”

“I was not! I just finished eating!”

“You finished eating about an hour ago, Zuko.”

Zuko scowled at him. “…That doesn’t sound right.”

Zikim’s sigh was the only response Zuko received.

Zuko took to pacing once more to keep himself awake for a while, but come nightfall, Suki joined him as he slumped onto the floor and reclined so that only his upper back was touching the wall behind him. “Don’t do it, Blue.”

He shook his head blearily. “I gotta.”

“You don’t. You can’t,” she pleaded.

“Gotta,” he repeated desperately.

“No, no, no. Blue, you promised. You promised me you wouldn’t sleep.”

“I did my best,” he protested. “That’s all I promised you. That’s all I ever promised anyone.”

Suki leaned over him, teary-eyed. “Live to fight another day, Blue,” she urged him. “Don’t give up without a fight.”

“I’m not,” Zuko argued. “I did fight. I’ve fought my whole life. Haven’t I done enough?”

SMASH!

“You haven’t. There’s still so much you haven’t done yet. You need to win the war by our side. You need to rebuild your nation. You need to help turn this world into a place where Lee can grow up safely, and happily. Don’t you still want all of that?”

SMASH!

“Of course I do,” he agreed. “But just because I want to doesn’t mean I will. Even if I stay awake right now, it doesn’t mean that I’ll be able to do all the things I want to do.”

“Help! Someone help!”

“I’m so tired, Suki,” Zuko whispered.

“What’s going on, Zikim?”

“It’s the prisoner – he’s convulsing – “

Zuko became aware, then, that he was going to die in this prison cell, and that nothing he had ever done was going to mean anything, and that he should, objectively, have never been born at all. Sokka was never going to know that he gave the absolute best hugs. Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot were never going to know that they had saved his life. Had he ever apologized to Longshot for burning him that one night? He didn’t think he had.

“Get a doctor! He’s having a seizure!”

“Blue,” Suki cried, “don’t – “

“ – long it lasts. It’s already lasted long enough to – “

“ – keep banging these cymbals?”

“What? Of course not. Why were – “

“ – would have died. I apologize if I mistook your priorities, Princess – “

Zuko woke up. There was fire. Someone was yelling.

Zuko went back to sleep.

Zuko woke up again. There was fire again, or maybe there was still fire. He tried to sleep again, but he was too awake. Disappointed, he opened his eyes and sat up. There were scorch marks all over his cell, and no guards, only Azula. “Oh, are you finally awake?” Azula sneered at him. “I was starting to think I’d have to settle for your dead body.”

He resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “What have I done to you now?”

“What did you do?” Azula shot a stream of fire at his feet, and he wanted to move, he truly did, but his legs were just so heavy. “You took her!” she snarled, wide-eyed, nostrils flared. It struck Zuko as significant that even through his fog of vaguely melancholic indifference, and even in comparison to her characteristically low standards for levelheadedness, she seemed wildly unhinged. He couldn’t imagine what would do that to her, although he did not expend much effort in trying either. “Ty Lee is gone! Even when I keep you under lock and key, you still take everything from me!”

I didn’t do anything, Zuko did not say, because he didn’t particularly feel like talking.

“I will keep you alive, brother. I will keep you here, safe and sound, until the day your miserable friends find themselves kneeling on this floor beside you, and I will make sure you see the light leave each and every one of their eyes before I let you join them.” She whirled around and slammed the door behind her. “I hope she was worth it, Zuko.”

The cymbals did not come back.

Neither did Mai.

Neither did Smellerbee, or Sokka, or Longshot, or Suki, or Azula.

He wondered if he could stay awake long enough of his own accord for his mind to conjure them once more.

To add insult to injury, there was no tea, either.

Except that there was one day.

Zuko stared at the kettle with as much curiosity as he had retained all these days, or weeks, or months, or however long he had been trapped. It had been a while since he had seen a kettle, although he had no way of quantifying ‘a while.’ He looked inside, and it was just plain water. Beside it was a dish of tea leaves. He couldn’t tell what leaves they were by examining them, so he must not have been familiar with them. Beside the dish, however, was a note that said ‘not poison’ in jarringly familiar handwriting. Jarringly familiar was the only way to describe it, because as he mentally took inventory of all the handwriting styles he might recognize, it fit into none of the categories. It did not belong to any of his friends. It did not belong to Lee, Sela, or Gansu. It didn’t belong to Piandao, or Iroh, or Azula, or Ty Lee, or Mai, or Ozai. He couldn’t think of another person whose handwriting would be so well-known to him.

Still, it was clearly labeled ‘not poison,’ and there were far easier ways to dispose of him at the moment. And though he had never claimed to like tea, he found that he missed it regardless.

There were no spark stones. Zuko looked at the leaves and the kettle and the dish of kindling it sat atop, and then he looked at his hands, and finally, he summoned the energy for one small lick of flame. It was just enough to ignite the kindling. He kept an eye out for guards, but none showed. He was pretty surprised by that, actually. Ever since the seizure, the guards had been particularly vigilant. It wasn’t like them to be absent for so long.

The tea was made soon. Zuko took a sip. He didn’t recognize the taste.

A few moments later, the world went dark.

The next shift in his consciousness felt more like falling asleep than waking up. His body hovered somewhere in mid-air, warmed by the deluge of sunlight so bright that it pervaded his eyelids. A few moments later, he registered the soft platform beneath him, the clicking of hooves against pavement, and the murmur of hushed conversation. Recognizing the voices, he fought against the last vestiges of sleep fighting to reclaim him and opened his mouth, though his eyes remained shut. He had something to say – what was it? There was something that had been absolutely vital –

“S’ka,” he mumbled, and the conversation ceased at once.

“…Zuko? You’re awake already?”

That’s right. He remembered what it was. Zuko searched his mind for each word that he would need to express himself, but only a few seemed to be within reach, so he reluctantly settled for them. “S’ka,” he repeated – oh, no. He felt his mind fading once more, reclaimed by unconsciousness, but he wasn’t done yet. With all the energy he possessed, he uttered the two key words, “…Best… hugs….”

His goal accomplished, Zuko returned to weightlessness as darkness swooped up from beneath him and enveloped him.

The sun was setting by the time he woke up properly, released by whatever had knocked him out so thoroughly. He took his time opening his eyes and sitting up before examining his surroundings. At least, he meant to examine his surroundings. He didn’t have much of a chance before a startled noise to his left drew his attention. “You’re awake!” Sokka chirped excitedly.

Zuko considered him for a few moments. Then he reached out and poked Sokka in the shoulder, confirming that Sokka was indeed tangible this time. Zuko was awake, and he wasn't hallucinating. Zuko was awake on a wagon in the middle of nowhere, surely miles from any form of civilization. He was free.

Chapter Text

We got no money
But we got heart
We're gonna rattle this ghost town
This house is falling apart

Anna Sun by Walk the Moon

Act III: The Prince

Chapter 15: Rattle This Ghost Town

“How are you feeling, Zuko?” Sokka asked in concern, after several moments passed by with Zuko’s finger still lightly prodding his shoulder. It took Zuko a few seconds to realize Sokka was addressing him, and by then the moment had passed and his voice was swallowed by the silence. Thankfully, Sokka swiftly prompted him again, “Zuko?”

“Yes,” Zuko answered, and then realized that that wasn’t an answer at all. “Uh… good?”

“Is that a statement or a question?”

“…A question, maybe.”

“You seem out of it. Ty Lee, how long should it have taken the sedative to wear off?”

“That depends on how well-fueled he is in terms of sleep and food, but considering his body weight, probably about eighteen hours,” Ty Lee piped up from somewhere on the ground beside their wagon, out of sight. “So a couple of hours ago, maybe?”

“I would like to know how I got here,” Zuko put forth.

“Well, the plan was originally to sneak in disguised as guards and smuggle you out,” Sokka supplied, glaring in Ty Lee’s direction. “Someone decided to sneak off and use their own plan without telling any other person ahead of time.”

“It’s not my fault none of you would listen to me,” Ty Lee sniffed.

“Actually, it’s completely your fault,” Sokka shot back. “Since you kidnapped our friend.”

“I got him back out!”

“Oh, so everything is fine now? Tell that to his face!” Sokka gestured violently to Zuko’s face, and Zuko flinched in the opposite direction. Sokka turned to face him immediately, wide-eyed with horror and remorse. “Oh, Tui and La, Zuko, I am so sorry. I wasn’t thinking at all.”

“It’s fine,” Zuko muttered, wishing Sokka hadn’t made such a big deal about it. “So what did Ty Lee do?”

“She got rid of all the guards somehow and sedated you, and then she came back to get help carrying you out,” Sokka explained. “I still don’t know why you had to sedate him.”

“I was worried that it would be jarring for him when we showed up out of nowhere and that he might accidentally alert the guards to our presence,” Ty Lee supplied.

“But who was the note from?” Zuko put forth.

“Oh, I didn’t want anyone to recognize my handwriting if they saw it, so I told Wishi it was part of the group plan and got her to write it for me.”

"Wishi?" Zuko echoed sluggishly, his brain struggling to connect dots that ought not to have even been on the same scrap of parchment. "From... Chin Village?" Wishi, the guard captain who wrote out all of the bounty posters in his favorite village. 'Familiar handwriting' indeed. "So it's you two and Wishi traveling together?"

“First it was me, Suki, and Smellerbee, and then Ty Lee found us and joined us, and then we ran into Wishi and her group. Apparently they’ve spent the past few months running covert missions in the Fire Nation while disguised as Fire Nation citizens, which is awesome, and when they heard we were with the Avatar they agreed to let us travel with them until we were closer to the facility you were being held in. Plus, when Wishi heard it was the Blue Spirit we'd come to rescue, she decided to come with us - as did Haki, whose parents' killer you apparently brought to justice." Sokka reached to pat Zuko on the shoulder, then seemed to think better of it, which was disappointing.

“Where is everyone now?” Zuko asked.

“Wishi, Haki, Suki, and Smellerbee all went to the market nearby to get supplies. I was left behind to watch you and the prisoner.”

“Yes, me, the prisoner,” Ty Lee drawled, uncharacteristically acerbic. “The prisoner who literally freely presented herself to you a month ago, escaped a few days ago without anyone noticing, and then presented herself to you yet again immediately afterwards, all while risking her life to help you save your friend from prison.”

“My friend who you put into prison, you mean?” Sokka sneered, also uncharacteristically acerbic.

"You can dislike me as much as you want, but you have no reason not to trust me anymore. Let me know when you're ready to release your prisoner so that your prisoner can look over her patient.”

Sokka opened his mouth, likely to fire off a rebuttal, but then he glanced at Zuko and his shoulders drooped. “Yes. I suppose that’s okay.” He hopped off of the wagon, and the clinking of chains indicated that Ty Lee had been released. “Just… don’t go anywhere… again.”

“Oh, you mean like I did two days ago while still chained up? What are you going to do, stop me?” With that, Ty Lee flounced into view. “Do you need help getting down, Zuko?”

“No,” Zuko responded automatically, crawling towards the exit, but then he realized that with his limited field of vision, he couldn’t see the steps leading to the ground and the world around him at the same time. The idea was fairly unnerving. Still, he soldiered on, making his way down the steps while training his left eye on them and listening carefully to his surroundings, ignoring the twinge in his left leg.

Ty Lee had clean bandages, a canteen, and a jar of honey waiting beside her where she sat, cross-legged. She frowned when she took a closer look at him. “You’re still wearing that bandage on your eye, huh? Were you burned there again after I left?”

“No.”

Ty Lee swallowed, visibly disturbed and a bit alarmed. “Okay. Let me just, um, take a look at this….” She gingerly peeled off the bandage, looking for all the world like she was performing surgery for the care she put into it. When the bandage was all the way off, she just looked lost. “Zuko, can you see out of your right eye?”

“…No.”

“Oh, no,” she breathed. “Oh, Agni.”

“What is it?” Sokka pressed, appearing at Zuko’s right side and flashing him an apologetic look when he started.

Ty Lee pressed both hands into her face for a second or two, then lowered them. “Zuko, your injury is healed.”

“Healed?” Sokka echoed. “So… when will he be able to see on that side again?”

Zuko’s stomach dropped.

Before either of them could reply to Sokka, before Zuko could even begin to process the sickening implications of this new information, someone shouted, “Hey, he’s awake!” and all three of them turned to see Suki, Smellerbee, Haki, and Wishi approaching with bags full of food. “Spirits, you look like crap, Blueko,” Smellerbee observed, setting her bags down beside the wagon. At that, Zuko had the strangest sense of déjà vu. “How are you feeling? Are hugs on the table?”

“Sure,” Zuko agreed, thankful for the distraction.

Smellerbee knelt beside him and pulled him into a tight hug. “Should I even bother telling you to never do anything like that ever again, or is that a losing battle with you?”

“Uh…, yeah, probably the second,” Zuko admitted sheepishly.

She sighed. “You could sound less happy about it.”

“Long time no see, Blue,” Wishi greeted him. “I have to say, you are way younger than I thought you would be.”

“I get that a lot.”

“So are you hurt badly?” Smellerbee asked him.

“I’m fine.”

She turned to Ty Lee. “Is he hurt badly?”

“I was just finding out when you guys got back.”

“Well, don’t let us get in your way,” Suki said. “Everybody, let’s give Ty Lee and Blue some space.” She ushered everyone away from the wagon. Zuko heard her say something about kindling as they vacated the area.

Ty Lee made quick work of removing his bandages, her typical small talk abandoned in light of her newly despondent disposition. Once she was finished, she took her time examining his wounds. “I guess Azula hadn’t visited you in a while?”

“Only once since she went looking for you. I’m not sure how long it’s been since then.”

“Your wrists could use a couple more weeks of bandages and honey, and the burns on your feet and legs need a few more days. Other than that, everything seems to have healed…. Wait. I think this might be infected.” Her fingertips traced the outline of a large burn on his left shin. Compared to the other burns nearby, it boasted a bright red, glossy sheen. “I’m going to touch your face now to check for a fever.” She pressed the back of her hand against his forehead. When she pulled away, her face was troubled. “You’re running pretty hot, Zuko, even for a firebender. I think you definitely have an infection. Haki!”

Haki trotted over to them. “Yeah?”

“Can you get a clean rag and soak it in the river please?”

“Sure.”

While they waited for her to return, Ty Lee set about carefully cleaning and applying honey to all his wounds. Haki swiftly delivered the wet rag. “Thanks, Haki.” She handed it to Zuko. “Keep this on the infected burn. You don’t need to put a lot of pressure on it, just a little.”

Zuko nodded and accepted the rag, wincing a little as it touched his skin.

She finished treating his injuries and hopped to her feet. “Come on, I think dinner is ready.” She reached out with one hand. “I’ll help you up.”

“I’m injured, not crippled,” Zuko retorted, pushing himself to his feet and dutifully ignoring the sting as his burned flesh stretched and twisted on his leg.

“Your leg is only going to get worse if you treat it like that,” Ty Lee pointed out. “Can I at least help you over to the campfire?”

“No.” As much as one could with a limp, Zuko stomped away from her and towards the campfire where the others sat, roasting skewered fish.

“Zuko,” Sokka said excitedly, “Zuko, you’re never gonna guess what Wishi has.”

“And what she and Sokka nearly killed each other over,” Smellerbee interjected abrasively.

“Here you go, Blue.” Wishi tossed a sword at his feet, and he started, again. Everyone politely ignored it this time, or perhaps they didn’t notice. “I looted this from a sandbender when I recognized it.”

Zuko turned from the sword to Sokka. “This isn’t the one I gave you in Ba Sing Se?”

“Nope!” Sokka patted Zuko’s old sheath at his side. “That’s the one I found in the North Pole. I kept it on Appa’s saddle, but then when Appa was taken by sandbenders, so was everything in the saddle.”

Sokka proceeded to explain the whole story about how Wishi and Haki met and later joined them, but Zuko soon found all the words blending together in a symphony of white noise. It seemed like moments later when Smellerbee cautiously prodded him and said, “Blueko? You there?”

“What? Um, yeah. Yes. I am here.”

“Very convincing,” she drawled, passing him a plate of fish and quinoa. “Not that I can blame you. Sokka’s storytelling leaves so much to be desired.”

“Hey!”

“Anyway, is no one going to address the fact that Zuko spontaneously awoke from a drug-induced coma just long enough to tell Sokka that he gives the best hugs before passing out again?”

Zuko nearly choked on his food. “I did what?”

“I’ve already addressed it!” Sokka declared. “I double-checked our itinerary and cut some other activities short so that I could schedule time for hugging Zuko!”

“You did not,” Smellerbee uttered in practically awed disbelief.

“I most certainly did.”

“The only things we had time for before were shopping, eating, and bathroom breaks!” Haki objected. “You can’t be serious!”

“We don’t have to stop for eating anymore, though!” Sokka gestured enthusiastically to Zuko, who flinched once more and drew the attention of everyone except Sokka. “We have a portable campfire now!”

“That is true,” Zuko voiced, mostly to make everyone stop looking at him like that. “I am a portable campfire.”

“As long as you don’t expect me to join in the hugs,” Smellerbee acquiesced, obliging his unspoken plea and resuming her normal expression. She was, briefly, his new favorite. Then she ruined it by adding hastily, “I mean, unless you want hugs from me. Then I will gladly hug you. Do you want hugs from me?”

Zuko had no idea what to say in response. Nothing in his entire life had prepared him to answer a question like that. Luckily, Sokka piped up, “Excuse you, I only scheduled hugs from me.”

“What?! Why don’t I get to hug him?!” Smellerbee barked, seeming to forget that she had previously not wished to give any hugs.

“And why do we need to stop just so you can hug him?” Haki put in.

“He’s injured! What if the wagon hits a bump while I’m hugging him and I accidentally knock him over or jostle his injuries – “

The group devolved into the youthful, mostly light-hearted bickering that Zuko was used to, but he couldn’t help but notice that Suki was awfully quiet. In fact, she hadn’t so much as spoken to or looked at him since they rescued him. He didn’t know who he could talk to about that. Sokka and Smellerbee would probably know what was going on or at least be able to figure it out, but Sokka might make things worse by trying to talk to Suki himself, and Smellerbee wasn’t any more likely to figure out a solution than he was. Ty Lee crossed his mind for a second, but though she was the kind of person who would help him solve the problem without interfering, she didn’t know Suki well enough to help.

What Zuko really needed was someone who was emotionally intelligent, a reliable secret keeper, and close to Suki. So pretty much, he thought, a little wistfully and more than a little bitterly, I need Aang.

Thankfully, the situation resolved itself when Suki approached him after dinner. Sokka conspicuously herded everyone else closer to the wagon to set up sleeping bags, so he must have been in on it. Zuko hadn’t yet risen, wondering if he should ask someone for help after all to avoid irritating his leg and possibly worsening it. However, Suki stood before him with an oddly formal posture, and Zuko instinctively stood to mirror her, forgetting the infection until it nipped at him. Then she bowed. Zuko was hit by another wave of déjà vu, for a less disturbing reason this time. “Zuko, I am so sorry for everything that happened to you – that I let happen to you,” she voiced remorsefully.

“Nothing that happened was your fault.”

“Maybe not mine by itself,” Suki allowed, “but I played a part in this. If I hadn’t been captured – “

“But you were,” Zuko interrupted. “’What-if’s don’t matter. All of us have made mistakes and slipped up before. Presumably, I got captured too when Azula brainwashed me with that Lake Laogai crap.”

“Presumably?”

“I don’t remember much of it,” he admitted. “But I know I must have gotten caught by her. Which means at the very least that I am just as guilty here as you are. So we can both go around feeling guilty, or we can accept that both of us did our best and move on.”

Suki stood upright and slowly smiled. “Okay. I think I like that second option more.”

“Great.”

She stepped forward, raising her arms. “Hug?”

“Um…, okay.”

Suki took another step forward and put one arm around his shoulders, one arm around his back. This was a simple and familiar hug, the kind he could vaguely remember exchanging in his childhood with Ty Lee and Mai when he hadn’t seen them in a while. He easily mimicked her movements, and then after just a second or two she released him and he followed suit. “Now let’s go help finish setting up camp. We need to get an early start tomorrow!”

“…and ox gall. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find ox gall? Or how expensive it is once you do find it?”

“Is this your idea of contributing? Listing all of the problems we have?”

“Could you lay off of each other for a single conversation, please?”

That was the confusing exchange Zuko awoke to later that night, or rather early the next morning judging by the deep reds and oranges on the horizon. He nearly got out of his sleeping bag to see what was going on, but then he heard, “I’m just saying, Zuko needs a lot more than we are equipped to provide,” and suddenly felt a lot less interested.

“That’s great, Ty Lee, you pretty much just said that a few moments ago too. If you’re not in it for the long haul, we can drop you off anywhere you like and you can go on your merry way.”

“Sokka, I’m serious.”

“I’m just saying that I haven’t heard anything even remotely constructive yet.”

“You haven’t given her a chance yet. You keep cutting her off.”

“Thank you, Suki. Anyway, I think what we need to do is hightail it to our meeting place at Cranefish Cove and hope Katara gets there early too. We don’t stand a chance of getting all the ingredients we need to make an infection-fighting poultice. Katara, though, might be able to heal him.”

“What if she can’t heal him?” Smellerbee spoke up for the first time since Zuko had woken. “Then we’ll be in the same position we’re in now, except that we’ll have spent a whole week focusing on traveling while his infection just gets worse. I don’t even know if they sell ‘ox gall’ or whatever in the Earth Kingdom. I’ve never heard of it.”

“I’m sure they have ox gall in the Earth Kingdom,” Ty Lee dismissed. “Ox gall is everywhere.”

“Then why is it so hard to find?” Sokka sneered.

“You know, for someone who is so concerned with constructive contributions, you aren’t making a lot of them!”

“Blueko, what do you think?” Smellerbee put forth.

It took Zuko a few moments to register that he was being addressed. Sokka seemed to share in his confusion, for he clarified, “Are you… talking to Zuko? The sleeping guy?”

Smellerbee snorted. “You think he’s still sleeping, with the way you two are carrying on?”

Zuko reluctantly pushed himself upright. “…I don’t know,” he replied, his jaw tensing in frustration. “Could end badly either way. I guess… if we head to Cranefish Cove, at least then we’ll be at the meeting point already. If Katara can’t heal me, that’s still less traveling to do while I’m down a leg. I don’t think the infection is bad enough to kill me any time soon. The burn isn’t recent, so the infection can’t be too recent, right?”

“True,” Ty Lee conceded. “Actually, the fact that you woke up so easily means that the infection can’t be too bad yet, because if the infection was bad then the fever would be bad and the fever would knock you out. But once the infection does get serious, it’s going to be that much harder to fix. And by then it’ll start progressing faster, too.”

In the morbid silence that followed, Wishi slumped over and sighed. “I bet they’ve got cool healing tricks up north,” she mused dryly. “How far is it to the Northern Water Tribe?”

Zuko thought for a moment. “Two weeks. And then another two weeks to get to Cranefish Cove from there.”

“Oh, man, you really are the Blue Spirit,” Wishi snorted. “No, Zuko, that was a joke. I wasn’t actually suggesting we go to the North Pole.”

“Wait! That’s it!” Sokka exclaimed. “Katara’s water! There’s no way that wouldn’t work.”

“I thought you guys said an infection might be too advanced,” Ty Lee ventured.

“It’s not just any water,” Suki amended. “It’s water from the North Pole.”

“And their water is, what, magical?”

“Not all of it. Just from a… particular place, the location of which we are not allowed to divulge. But they called it spirit water, and they said it can heal absolutely anything.”

“So… it’s settled, then?” Smellerbee confirmed. “We’re going straight to Cranefish Cove to find Katara and have her heal Zuko’s infection with magic spirit water?”

Suki looked around at everyone and nodded. “Yep. We’ve got a plan!”

“We’ve got an idea,” Sokka corrected. “A plan would include more finite details like ‘how are we getting there.’”

“So how are we getting there, strategy guy?” Suki shot back.

“We’re gonna steal another ship!”

“Another?” Wishi verified.

Zuko smirked. “Good plan. That’s one of my specialties.”

“I’m sorry, one of your specialties? Are you the Avatar’s friends or a band of pirates?”

“Wouldn’t be my first time.”

“What?!” Sokka shrieked. “You were a pirate?! I need details right now. No, wait. Plan first. Details later. Hey, Fire Nation scum, where’s the nearest harbor?”

Ty Lee rolled her eyes. “I am not answering to that.”

“Ha! You just did!”

That night, all of them crouched as low as they could as the wagon came to a stop just outside a harbor. “You guys, stay here,” Suki instructed. “Ty Lee and I will go find the easiest sailboat to steal, find the most discreet path there, and come back to help carry all our stuff.”

“I don’t like this,” Sokka objected.

“For the last time,” Suki sighed, “Ty Lee and I are the only two with actual stealth training, so it doesn’t matter whether or not you like this. Besides, she’s had much better opportunities to turn us in or whatever else she’d like to do with us.”

“I don’t like this either,” Zuko voiced. Everyone except Ty Lee turned to him in surprise. Ty Lee looked a bit hurt, but not surprised. Zuko quickly elaborated, “Not the ‘you two going alone’ thing. I just… have a better idea than a sailboat that I just now thought of.”

“Oh, yes.” Smellerbee clasped her hands together, grinning widely. “It’s time for a Crazy Blueko Plan! I love these. Lay it on me.”

“Wha – I don’t have that many crazy plans,” Zuko protested.

“Within two days of meeting you, I walked right through a giant Fire Nation barricade wearing their uniforms, stole a prisoner headed for the most high-security prison in the Fire Nation, and kidnapped a governor inside his own home.”

“…Those were flukes,” Zuko grumbled.

“So your plan isn’t crazy?”

“…This is also a fluke.” At Smellerbee’s responding cackle, he added indignantly, pointing to a ship on the outskirts of the harbor, “It’s just – there is a perfectly good warship right there.”

“A warship,” Suki repeated faintly. “Did you – Did you hear me say easiest boat to steal?”

“I don’t think he knows that word,” Smellerbee advised her, still cackling a little bit.

“Hear me out,” Zuko urged. “A sailboat might seem discreet, but the fastest route to Cranefish Cove goes right through extremely restricted waters. And warships are faster in general even if we took the longer route.”

“I’m on board,” Smellerbee declared. “I miss Crazy Blueko Plans. Life is so boring without them.”

“Yeah, that’s a glowing recommendation,” Wishi muttered.

Zuko perked up at Smellerbee’s word choice. “Hey, that was a pun!”

“What?” She frowned at him. “…’on board.’ Ha, I didn’t even notice! Nice.”

Suki hummed. “I didn’t think I’d be stealing a second warship so soon, but if you think you can get us on that boat, I trust you.”

“Oh, what the hell.” Wishi shrugged. “I’m in, too.”

“I’m in if Wishi’s in,” Haki agreed.

“You can stay here if you’re too scared,” Sokka taunted Ty Lee.

“What, like stealing a warship is scarier than sneaking into a jail cell right down the street from the Fire Nation palace itself?” Ty Lee retorted.

“So what’s the plan, Blue?” Suki asked him.

“I need to investigate the warship to find out which model it is. Then I can determine the best place to breach it.”

“You shouldn't be going anywhere," Ty Lee disagreed.

Zuko scowled. “I spent three years as a bounty hunter. I know how to sneak around even with an injured leg.”

“I actually wasn’t even thinking about your leg, although that’s a perfectly valid reason by itself. I was thinking that you haven’t been in the Fire Nation for three years and that I can probably make that decision better than you can,” Ty Lee reasoned.

“I hate to side with Ty Lee, but she has a point,” Sokka conceded. “Didn’t you tell me once that you accidentally breached someone’s bedroom instead of the cargo hold?”

Zuko deflated. “That’s… fair. Fine. Once you’ve made your decision, Ty Lee, come back and get me. There are probably at least a few soldiers in their cabins, so we need to get rid of them…, but we can’t let them see us, either. We’re a pretty distinctive group.” He grimaced. If they had Katara or Toph with them, they could flood the ship, repair it, and be on their way. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much that a firebender could do to scare off other firebenders. “Hey, Azula’s never seen you two, right?” He looked to Wishi and Haki, who shook their heads. “Haki, do you know how to fight?”

“I can hold my own. Wishi’s been teaching me for half a year.”

“Good.” He turned to Ty Lee. “If you wear your hair down, do you think you’ll look indistinct enough that Azula won’t recognize a description of you in the morning?”

“Whatever you need her for,” Suki interrupted, “I’ll do it instead. In the dark, I look enough like a Fire Nation citizen to pass. Azula might know my face, but she knows Ty Lee’s face much better, and she’s on the lookout for Ty Lee in particular right now, not me.”

Zuko hated putting Suki in that kind of danger, but she was right. “Okay. Here’s what’s going to happen.”

A few moments, Sokka, Ty Lee, and Smellerbee hid in woods with all of their supplies beside the harbor. Wishi and Haki were hidden in the cargo hold of the warship, waiting for their cue. Zuko and Suki approached the sailboat docked across from the warship together. “Are you sure you want to do this?” Suki prompted. “I haven’t seen you bend since we rescued you. Is this going to be okay? We can always take the sailboat instead….”

“I’m fine,” Zuko affirmed confidently. “I appreciate your concern, but I have been bending, actually. It’s been weirdly cold for the middle of spring, so I’ve been keeping myself warm with firebending.”

Suki did not looked reassured. “It’s almost summer, Zuko.”

Zuko recoiled and looked away. “I… guess I was gone longer than I thought. Still, though – “

“And it hasn’t been cold. At all.” Her face only grew more and more worried. “Ty Lee said that chills are a sign of the infection getting worse. Maybe we should call this whole thing off – “

“If the infection is getting worse,” Zuko sighed, “then the best thing we can do is get the fastest ship here, right?”

“…You’re right.” Suki stepped back. “You’re going to be careful, right?”

“I promise,” Zuko said, cringing at his own word choice. Suki didn’t seem to notice, so he departed and ventured into the sailboat. Once he was inside, he blasted a hole in the wall, and then he set the boat on fire.

He carefully maintained a bubble of fire around him and the hole, preventing the flames from getting too close to him or cutting off his oxygen. It proved more difficult than he had anticipated with his limited eyesight, but he focused on feeling the flames as well as seeing them. Soon he heard Suki’s voice shouting outside, “Right here! My friend is inside! Please, you have to help him – neither of us can bend!”

Zuko leaned close to the hole, took a big gulp of clean air, and called into the flames, “Help! I’m in here!”

Once he’d heard enough from the firebending soldiers outside to confirm that they were coming to help, he climbed through the hole and lowered himself into the water, then swam under the dock over to the shore beside the warship, where Sokka was waiting to pull him up. Sokka gave him a thorough examination, then grinned giddily at him. “You’re not even singed!”

“I told you I’d be fine,” Zuko scoffed. “All of you worry too much.”

“Oh, don’t even try that,” Sokka rebuked scathingly. “I’m going to have gray hair by the time I’m twenty thanks to you alone.”

Zuko, Sokka, and Smellerbee watched the warship for a couple of minutes. Then Haki poked her head out of a porthole and tossed down a rope ladder. Zuko and Smellerbee began their ascent. Sokka waited down below to make sure Suki didn’t need help sneaking away from the soldiers even though Ty Lee was hiding in the shadows nearby for precisely that reason, but soon all seven of them were safely stowed away within the warship with their belongings. “Sokka, you can pilot, right?”

“Of course.”

“Great. You’re on piloting duty. Wishi, Haki, keep an eye out for soldiers. The rest of you, hide. I’m going down to the engine room to get the coal burning. Someone come get me when we’re far enough away from the harbor to be safe.”

Zuko hastily made his way down to the engine room and ignited each pile of coal as he passed it. Then he sat cross-legged in the center of the room and began meditating on each of the flames around him, maintaining the highest temperature he could across them to optimize his coal-burning rate. Soon enough, he was collected by Smellerbee.

The following afternoon, the Gates of Azulon appeared on the horizon, so they hunkered down at the table in the bridge to plot their approach. Suki addressed Zuko. “You, Ty Lee, and I will be the ones on deck when they double check our credentials. There are spare uniforms on the ship that we can use, and Wishi snagged the badges of those soldiers she and Haki took care of.”

“Ty Lee’s the one who reminded me, though,” Wishi pointed out.

“Thanks, Ty Lee,” Suki acknowledged. “Your alias is Chazi. I’ll be using Shao, and Ty Lee will be using Lio. What other kind of information will they ask for?”

“Our current mission, for one,” Ty Lee offered, scratching her head.

“Heading to Ba Sing Se, maybe?” Sokka suggested. “To help control the citizens there?”

Ty Lee shook her head. “Wrong kind of ship. This is built to fight in a warzone. Where is there a lot of naval fighting…?”

“Uh….”

All of their heads whipped around towards a lone soldier standing in the doorway. At once, they leapt to their feet and drew their weapons. “Who are you?” Sokka demanded, lunging forward and putting his sword to the soldier’s throat.

“H-Hey!” The soldier nervously put his hands up. “…Rightfully, I should be asking you who you are, since this is the ship I’m stationed on – “

“Name, now,” Sokka growled.

“Yaron!” he blurted out. “My name is Yaron, and I’m a soldier on this ship.” He looked around, carefully keeping distance between his neck and Sokka’s sword. “So, um… who – who are you guys?” His eyes widened, and he gulped visibly. “Are you pirates?! I – I don’t have anything of value, I swear!”

Smellerbee quirked an eyebrow disdainfully at Zuko, indicating her low opinion of the guy’s intelligence and character. One corner of Zuko’s lips ticked upwards, and he released a short breath through his nose in silent, borderline amused agreement.

“We took this ship from your colleagues,” Suki informed him scornfully, “while you… hid, I presume?”

“What? No, no way, man! Er, ma’am. Sir? Listen, I just woke up.”

“…Excuse me?” Suki stared, dumbfounded.

“We searched the whole ship,” Sokka protested. “Where were you sleeping?”

“Bathtub.”

“The bathtub.”

“Yeah, sleeping in a bed wrinkles my clothes.”

“That’s… what pajamas are for?”

“Nah, I was too tired to change last night.”

“We’ve been here for at least eighteen hours,” Suki burst out. “What do you mean you just woke up? How did you sleep for eighteen hours?”

Yaron shrugged.

“I can’t believe this,” Wishi muttered under her breath.

After a lengthy pause, Sokka suddenly smirked. “So, Yaron. Give us one good reason not to throw you overboard.”

Yaron blanched. “I’m completely harmless, I swear! Please, just drop me off at the nearest port. I’ll do anything!”

“Anything?” Sokka pressed. Zuko fought off a grin as he realized where Sokka was going with this.

“Anything!” Yaron nodded frantically.

Suki considered him for a few moments. “Let me talk things over with my group, and then we’ll see.” She turned and surveyed them thoughtfully. “Haki, would you mind keeping an eye on him?”

“Sure,” Haki replied, striding towards Yaron to take over for Sokka.

The other six congregated around the table once more, this time with their voices much lower. “Seems like a fair trade,” Sokka began. “He keeps his life, we get through the Gates of Azulon with no problem. The question is: Can we trust him?”

“He seems too stupid to plot against us, but he could be faking it,” Suki cautioned. “For all we know, he could turn us in as soon as we get there.”

“I don’t know about that,” Zuko countered. “If he did that, then there would be questions about where his unit is, and how we got on the ship, and how he’s still okay. It would be really easy for them to disbelieve his story and decide that he betrayed his unit. Even if they didn’t decide that, they still probably wouldn’t believe him. They’d just think he hid, which is still a betrayal. Besides, we’re going to hide him below deck when we get there, right? So he won’t even have a chance to turn us in. It’s in his best interests to be honest with us.”

“Follow-up question: Is he dumb enough to lie anyway?” Sokka queried.

“If he is that dumb, I think we’ll probably be able to tell he’s lying,” Smellerbee pointed out.

“That’s fair,” Suki acquiesced. “Alright, I vote that we work with him.” Everyone agreed, so Suki waved Haki and Yaron over. “Don’t try anything,” she warned Yaron. “You’re lucky we’ve decided to give you a chance. Don’t make us regret it.”

“I absolutely will not, sir!” Yaron beamed at her.

“Tell us about your unit’s mission and any other pertinent details, and we’ll let you go as soon as we’re through the Gates of Azulon.”

Yaron deflated. “O-Oh. I thought you’d want me to do, like, work or something. Could I just be your slave until you get wherever you’re going? I can cook really, really well!”

Suki scowled. “We don’t need that kind of help. It’s information or no deal.”

Yaron squirmed anxiously. “…Okay. I guess I don’t have a choice. We were… reinforcements, heading towards Chameleon Bay to help on the battlefront.”

“Great. So what do we need to know in order to get through those gates?”

Zuko eyed him warily as he answered all of Suki’s questions. It made sense for Yaron to be on edge, but he seemed… just a little too on edge. He pulled Smellerbee and Sokka into a different room towards the end of the interrogation. “Something seems off about him.”

“Really?” Sokka asked, surprised.

Smellerbee nodded. “Yeah, I think so too. What do you wanna do about it?”

“Keep an eye on him, for starters, but we were going to do that regardless.” Zuko thought for a few moments. “There’s not much else we can do between now and then, but once we get there, if his information proves false, we can always say that our orders changed and name-drop a random general. I’ll get a name from Ty Lee.”

“No, I’ll do it,” Sokka said, crossing his arms and casting a glare in her direction.

“…O…kay…?” Zuko drew out the word bemusedly.

Smellerbee snorted. “You do that, Sokka. Anyway, that only helps if just our destination is wrong. What if our unit number is wrong?”

“Tell them we got it mixed up?” Sokka suggested.

Zuko and Smellerbee exchanged a look, and then directed that same look at Sokka.

“Got it. Not an option.”

“We could always bring Yaron out and blame it on him,” Smellerbee recommended. “Hey! What if we just stick him in Sokka’s Water Tribe clothes and call him a prisoner? That would be a good distraction.”

“That’s a terrible thing to do!” Sokka objected. “Yeah, he’s Fire Nation, but he’s just a random dude trying to live his life.”

“He’s a Fire Nation soldier,” Smellerbee corrected. “Not a citizen. You don’t know what he’s already done.”

“Neither do you,” Sokka shot back.

“It doesn’t matter,” Zuko interjected hastily, wondering how he had come to a point in his life where he was a mediator and not an aggressor, “because I don’t think it’ll work. There will be enough soldiers there that some can admit him as a prisoner while others continue interrogating us.”

Smellerbee sighed. “Can we just threaten to kill him if he turns out to have lied to us? Threaten!” she repeated emphatically when Sokka opened his mouth again. “We don’t have to actually kill him afterwards.”

“He could decide to try and escape before we get there,” Zuko contradicted. “Just because he’d definitely fail doesn’t mean he wouldn’t believe it to be a viable option.”

“What if we make a bigger distraction than a prisoner transfer?” Sokka proposed. “Wishi and Haki aren’t associated with us by the Fire Nation yet. Once someone important comes aboard, they can take whoever it is hostage and force them to let us through, and then ‘force’ you, Suki, and Ty Lee to steer us away from the Fire Nation.”

“Hey, that’s actually a solid plan,” Smellerbee observed, surprised.

Sokka puffed out his chest. “Well, I am the strategy guy,” he boasted.

“Go fill everyone in on this plan, Strategy Guy,” Smellerbee directed, rolling her eyes. “I’m talking to Blueko for a second.”

Sokka left them alone, and Zuko waited to see what Smellerbee wanted to talk about, curious and vaguely apprehensive despite himself.

“How do we feel about Ty Lee?”

Zuko was taken aback. That was a strange thing to ask him, and not on the list of potential topics he had conceived of. “What do you mean?”

“I want to take your lead here,” Smellerbee explained. “Are we still mad at her? Are we gonna get out of this and never want to see her again? Can you ever see yourself being friends with her after this?”

“It’s not out of the question,” Zuko answered, caught off-guard, especially since he hadn’t really thought about it himself until then. “She’s risked a lot for this, and lost a lot. I don’t want to cut her out of my life. Logically, I know she didn't have a much of a choice - "

"Don't make excuses for her," Smellerbee scolded. "We all have choices. Every time she decided to help Azula, she made a choice. It's totally understandable if you haven't forgiven her, or if you never do forgive her."

Taking in Smellerbee's thoughts and giving them their due consideration, Zuko forced himself to slow down and really think about his own feelings before responding. "I guess I haven't forgiven her. I'm definitely not comfortable around her. I don't know if I will be or how long it'll take. But... people make mistakes. I've made mistakes. If she's really trying to fix them, I think I will forgive her, someday."

“So give her a hard time, but not an unforgivably hard time,” Smellerbee extrapolated. “Got it.” Zuko made to leave, but she called him back, her speech uncharacteristically reticent and faltering. “Wait! There was… actually one more thing that I’ve been meaning to ask you about.”

Zuko stopped and faced her again. “Okay.”

“Back at the lake, Longshot… said something.”

The silence following that statement dragged on so long that Zuko felt his newly-abolished apprehension returning full-force. “Are you… going to tell me what?”

Smellerbee exhaled slowly and shakily, leaning against a wall and shooting him a uncertain smile that was not remotely reassuring. “Sorry, I’m just trying to get my thoughts together. I’m not good at this kind of thing. I don’t know if this is the wrong time to bring it up, and if it is, I don’t know if it’s worse to let it stew, or if there will ever be a right time. I don’t even know how to say it.” She straightened her back. “I’m just gonna do my best, so…, let me know if you feel uncomfortable at all, okay?”

Yep, that did absolutely nothing to obstruct his growing unease. “Uh…, okay.”

“Longshot said… that you tried to kill yourself before we met you.”

The weight of the words slammed into Zuko’s chest, leaving him dizzy and breathless. “Oh.”

“Is that true?”

Zuko swallowed. “Yeah.”

“Did you… ever think about that, while you were imprisoned?”

“…Yeah, I did.” He’d thought about bringing it up several times in the past, but the words had always gotten stuck in his throat. Now that Smellerbee was prompting him, it felt easy, just like a normal conversation with a friend. “I didn’t try again, though.”

Smellerbee nodded as she took that in. “Is that because you didn’t want to, or because you didn’t have the means to? It’s okay if it’s the second one. It was a bad time. I get it.”

Zuko had to think about that for a moment. The distinction hadn’t made a difference to him back then, so he’d never made one. It still didn’t, but it clearly did to Smellerbee. “I guess I did give up for a while, but I never actively wanted to kill myself, if that makes sense. I knew you guys would try to come for me. I just didn’t think you’d succeed.”

Smellerbee’s eyes widened. “You knew?”

Zuko flushed self-consciously. “Well – I – “

“No, it’s just – “ Smellerbee paused. “This whole time, one of the things I was most worried about was that you didn’t know. That you would feel alone, or… abandoned.” Of all the terrible things he had felt, ‘abandoned’ hadn’t been on the list. He supposed that was one thing to be grateful for. He had always known that if they could get to him, they would. He opened his mouth to assure her of that, but she spoke first. “Do you want to talk about the time you tried to kill yourself? Like what happened that made you do that?”

He felt no pressure from her one way or the other, but within a few seconds of deliberation, he found the words spilling out of him freely, and he didn’t care to stop them. “A few things happened. I didn’t realize this back then, but part of it was that the man who had my mother killed was dead. For a long time, killing him was what kept me going. On top of that, my mask was set on fire in the fight and one of my swords was lost. My identity, of course, was revealed, so I was a wanted man afterwards. I didn’t see a way forward.”

Smellerbee worried her bottom lip, eyes flashing with concern. “But what changed between then and when we met you?”

Zuko thought back to the days following his attempt and searched for the right words. “Someone saved my life and gave me shelter for a short while. I promised them, when I left, that I would never give up without a fight.” He chuckled self-deprecatingly. “I thought I was close to fulfilling that promise by the time I met Toph. Then she convinced me to go to Ba Sing Se, and then I met you three.”

“Wow,” Smellerbee remarked, drawing out the syllable. “So Toph kinda saved your life, huh?” She grinned. “You should tell her that. She’d love that.”

“Hah.” Zuko grinned back. “Yeah, maybe.”

“Guys!” Sokka called to them from the doorway. He was wearing a darker scowl than Zuko had seen from him since Zuko had been trying to kidnap Aang. “We’re almost there, and we’ve got a problem. A big one.”

“What’s up?” Smellerbee asked immediately, following him back out. Zuko was at her heel, jarred by the abrupt change in atmosphere.

“Yaron,” Sokka grumbled. “That idiot – well, I’ll just let him tell you himself.” The three of them arrived back in the bridge. Zuko glanced out of a porthole and saw the Gates of Azulon practically looming over them. “Yaron?” Sokka prompted venomously.

Yaron cowered. “So, the – the thing is, is, well – “

“Get on with it,” Suki barked, interrupting his stammering.

“I may have misled you all just a bit.”

“He lied to us,” Sokka growled. “Everything he told us was fake!”

“I knew we should have done the fake prisoner thing,” Smellerbee muttered resentfully.

“Wait! It’s not like that!” Yaron yelped urgently.

“Oh yeah? Then what is it like?” Sokka challenged.

“I – I – I don’t know our destination!” Yaron blurted out. “Or our unit number, or any codes or passwords, or any of that stuff! I don’t know anything confidential!”

“Then why did you say you did?” Suki demanded.

“You said you were going to throw me overboard!” Yaron exclaimed indignantly. “What else was I supposed to do?”

“He’s got a point,” Ty Lee commented.

“You don’t have a say here, Fire Nation!” Sokka snapped at her.

Wishi groaned, rubbing her face with one hand. “I don’t understand how you can claim to be a soldier on this ship without knowing the most basic information that any soldier should know. I mean, you didn’t even know where you were going?”

“No one tells me anything,” Yaron admitted. “I’m not any good at keeping secrets.”

Smellerbee snorted. “You mean they were expecting this – for you to break the second someone questioned you.”

“No! I mean…, kinda? But – But not the way you’re thinking! I would never tell someone our destination, but if someone happened to guess….” Yaron made a guilty, sheepish face that was probably an excellent demonstration of what face he would make under the described circumstances.

Smellerbee stared exasperatedly. “Spirits, you are such a loser.”

“I know that, alright?!” Yaron threw his hands in the air, prompting many of them to partially unsheathe their weapons. He didn’t seem to notice. “I didn’t even want to be a stupid soldier! I wanted to be a chef!”

“Look, we don’t have time for all this,” Suki said sharply. “Zuko, Ty Lee, get your uniforms on. The rest of you, come up with a plan. And you,” she grabbed Yaron by the front of his shirt and shoved him into a wall, “if we don’t make it out of this, we’re telling them you were in on it.”

“Understood,” Yaron squeaked.

“Actually, we’ve already got most of a plan,” Sokka announced as Zuko, Suki, and Ty Lee left the room.

When Zuko reemerged from the bedchambers and returned to the bridge, everyone seemed a lot more sure of themselves than they had when he left. “Zuko, you’re coming down to the deck with Ty Lee and me,” Suki told him, already dressed. “Haki will be holding Yaron here ‘hostage,’” she patted an extremely pale Yaron on the shoulder a little too hard, her irritation thinly veiled under mock cheer, “and Wishi will be lying in wait to actually take someone hostage as soon as someone important boards our ship. Smellerbee will be just above deck in the conning tower, waiting in case Wishi needs backup. If something goes wrong… well, let’s hope nothing goes wrong.”

“I’ll be here in the bridge, ready to speed off as soon as that gate goes down,” Sokka supplied. He looked outside and winced. “Places, everyone. It’s time.”

“ – sentence two young men to death. That’s just like your family, isn’t it?”

“Those young men sentenced themselves to death with their carelessness. This is why my units are so much more successful than yours; we cut our dead weight. You spoil yours.”

“I am begging you to reconsider, Admiral Sazim. Let me take the fall for any damage done here. I’ll go before the Fire Lord himself to plead my case. Just let them go.”

“Well, this is fun,” Suki muttered under her breath. The argument between the two admirals had been happening for at least fifteen minutes, ever since Wishi had accidentally taken a commander hostage instead of an admiral. Then again, if they had taken Admiral Nikosa hostage instead, Admiral Sazim would probably have just let her die without anyone to fight him on it, so it was a good thing they hadn’t.

“We could just let Haki kill Yaron to prove we’re serious.”

Suki smacked him on the arm, but snickered quietly all the same.

Zuko took a deep breath and prepared to feign interest in Yaron’s lifespan. “Do you need our cargo?” he questioned Wishi loudly. He sorely missed the ability to wink, but settled for flicking his left eye from side to side urgently, a more subtle thing than shaking his head.

Wishi got the message. “No, we don’t. Just the ship.”

Zuko turned to the two quarreling admirals. “What if we give you all of our cargo? The weapons, the supplies – all of it. Then could you let us all go?”

“That sounds reasonable,” Nikosa urged her colleague.

Said colleague scowled. “I don’t negotiate with terrorists.”

“I could even let these guys come back with the ship once I’m gone,” Wishi said in a bored voice. “We just need the ride.”

Nikosa’s eyes lit up. “Could you give us a moment to deliberate?”

Wishi and Haki exchanged glances and carefully did not look at anyone else. “I… suppose so,” Wishi acquiesced. “But not too long. I’m running out of patience.”

Nikosa sent a low-ranking officer off for something, then pulled Sazim into a hushed conversation. By the time they returned to negotiations, another, much smaller ship had pulled up along the other side of the gate. “If you lower your bow to this empty, fully-functioning, nonbender-oriented ship, we will lower the gates for you to cross over to it,” Nikosa extended, “but you must release your hostages as soon as you are past the gate. If you do not, we will bring the gate right back up regardless of who is in the way, and we will immediately go on the offensive. Do you find these terms agreeable?”

Zuko tensed his jaw, realizing that this was the best they were going to get while also realizing that if they agreed, Zuko, Ty Lee, and Suki would need to stay on the ship to keep up their cover. Was there a way for them to sneak or lie their way over to the other ship, or would they have to make a run for it?

Wishi’s eyes darted around as she considered her options. “…One condition. We keep our personal belongings.”

Sazim shrugged defeatedly. “Sure.”

Wishi turned to Zuko, Suki, and Ty Lee. “You three! Go downstairs and get my stuff.”

Zuko, Suki, and Ty Lee hastily escaped into the conning tower now that they’d been given an exit. “What is going on out there?” Smellerbee hissed when they reached her.

“They’re going to attack us as soon as we leave no matter what, aren’t they?” Ty Lee remarked resignedly.

“Absolutely,” Zuko confirmed. “Smellerbee, go get Sokka and tell him to lower the bow. Suki, pack our essentials. Ty Lee, tell Wishi and Haki that their stuff will be out soon and ask them to wait on our side of the bow. Oh, and tell the admirals that there’s a leak in the engine room.”

“Excuse me?” Smellerbee cut in.

“We need a bigger distraction. I’m going downstairs to sink the ship.”

“What?!” Suki whisper-shrieked at him. “That was not part of the plan, Blue!”

Zuko ignored her and dashed down the steps to the engine room. He shoveled one pile of coal over to the wall and set it on fire. Then he set about shoveling the rest of the coal over as fast as he could. That was not very fast at all. He had failed to account for his loss of strength during his imprisonment.

“Zuko!”

Zuko definitely did not scream when Sokka materialized loudly on his right, but it was a near thing.

“Oh, man, Zuko, I am so sorry about that,” Sokka said for the fourth or fifth time since rescuing him. “But I’m here to help!” He shoved a handful of – to be frank, Zuko wasn’t sure what was shoved into his hands. “You set these on fire and I’ll shovel coal.”

“What are these?”

Sokka grinned smugly. “Let’s just say you don’t want to be holding them when they burn out.”

Zuko set the tiny items up in a row beside the coal and ignited them. Soon, they exploded, leaving huge dents in the walls.

“Aw, dang it.” Sokka frowned. “I thought they would blow holes.”

“This is fine,” Zuko assured him. “Once the metal gets weak enough, it’ll just – “

The metal cracked and gave way, letting water come rushing into the engine room.

“Yeah. That.”

“Come on, let’s go!” Sokka exclaimed, tugging on his arm.

“Hang on – this place needs to be sinking faster for our escape. Let me melt this a bit more.”

Sokka eyed him dubiously. “Are you being reckless again?”

“No. I am being extremely careful right now. I’m not going to drown, or explode, or anything. I’m gonna be just fine.”

“…Uh-huh.” Sokka stuck around and watched him suspiciously, but true to his word, Zuko only stayed long enough to burn up another section of wall. As soon as the water reached a less sluggish pace and began climbing past his knees, he and Sokka sloshed out of the engine room and joined everyone except Wishi and Haki in the conning tower.

“There you are!” Smellerbee exclaimed, several packs slung haphazardly over her shoulders. “I was about to go down after you.”

“What is the plan now?” Suki demanded. “Please tell me somebody has a plan.”

“Absolutely,” Sokka promised. “…Zuko does. Right? Buddy?”

“I’m heading up to the bridge,” Zuko declared, ignoring everyone’s exasperated groans with practiced ease. “While everyone’s distracted by the sinking, I’m going to inch us forward so that when they raise the gates, Wishi and Haki are on the other side. Smellerbee, Sokka, you can go out there as part of Wishi’s group. Suki, Ty Lee, you can stand with them and pretend to be guarding them or something.”

“How are you getting off, Blueko?” Smellerbee questioned long-sufferingly.

In response, he held up one last tiny bomb he’d stored away. “I was figuring I’d blow a hole in the wall and swim.”

“You can’t swim!” Suki and Sokka shouted at him in unison.

“Yes, I can!” Zuko snapped. “I was just distracted those times!”

“Oh, and all this,” Sokka gestured with both hands to everything around them, “isn’t distracting?”

“You go pretend to be guarding them.” Ty Lee swiped the bomb and darted past him and up the stairs to the bridge without further ado. “I know how to pilot a ship, too!” she called over her shoulder as she disappeared onto the upper floor.

“How are you getting off?!” Zuko protested, but she was either too distant to hear him or purposely ignoring him.

“Look, Zuko, Ty Lee is like ten times stronger and more acrobatic than you right now and we don’t have time for you to be offended by that,” Sokka informed him brusquely. “I trust Ty Lee to be able to land safely in the water from that height and swim all the way to the other side way more than you.”

Zuko was summarily herded out of the conning tower by everyone. They took their time picking their way across the deck past all the soldiers moving cargo. He and Suki kept Sokka and Smellerbee in front of them. When they reached Wishi, Haki, and their hostages, Zuko noted that they still weren’t far enough past the gate to be safe when it rose. “I have to insist that I look through your belongings before we hand them over in case your companions stowed anything of ours away in there,” Zuko announced, stalling.

“Privates, that ship is sinking,” Nikosa called to them. “I appreciate your thoroughness, but you don’t have time for an inspection. All four of you need to help us transport the cargo to land.”

“And where is that girl who was out here earlier?”

Incidentally, that question was spoken in a booming, aggressive voice, and came from Sazim, who was suddenly standing directly on Zuko’s right.

Zuko started so violently in the opposite direction that he lost his balance and went flailing. This might have been a comical scene if it weren’t for the facts that a) it was a harsh reminder of his recent traumas, b) he had definitely drawn a dangerous amount of attention to himself, c) his leg hurt like a fucking bitch now, and d) he had been right at the edge of the bow when that happened. So now? He was in the fucking ocean. Drowning. Again. He and the ocean had had a pretty good relationship recently but now he thought he might be back to hating it.

Not gonna drown, not gonna drown, not gonna drown, he thought fiercely, but he was, indeed, drowning. It was one thing to swim with only one good leg and another thing entirely to try and cease drowning with only one good leg. That second thing was proving difficult. He broke the surface long enough to suck in a deep breath, but when a wave pushed him back under, the breath ran out almost immediately. Absently, he wondered if drowning had always tired him so quickly.

The minimal vision he had was growing dark around the edges when an arm secured itself around his stomach. That felt, briefly, like an absolutely terrible place for an arm to be, but then it tugged him back up to the surface where he spat out as much water as he could and inhaled strenuously. “Come on, Zuko, we’re gonna make it,” someone promised. “You just gotta keep breathing.”

Zuko did not answer in favor of maintaining a high oxygen-to-water ratio in his lungs.

Moments later, he was being heaved high, high into the air and settled on a stable platform. “Hate the ocean,” Zuko rumbled when he was done spewing water. “So much. What is the ocean even there for? Why do we need that? Can we just get rid of it?” He pushed himself upright, his breath shaky.

“Sure, Zhao,” Suki retorted.

Sokka tilted his head at him. “Didn’t the ocean literally save your life just a few months ago?”

“That was Aang,” Zuko muttered mutinously. “All I’m saying is that I can see where Zhao was – “ He leaned forward and hit the ground.

“So just to clarify, you’re telling me that I have an infection and pneumonia now?”

Ty Lee grimaced. “Unfortunately, yes.”

Zuko groaned miserably and rolled onto his stomach, pressing his face into the pillow. “You should have let me drown.”

“After all that effort I went through to rescue you the first time?" she teased. "Besides, you’re totally right. Sokka gives the best hugs. I wouldn’t miss out on that for anything.”

Zuko sighed. “I’m assuming you didn’t pack any cures for pneumonia before we left land.”

“’Cure’ is a strong word. I would call them ‘recovery boosters.’ But, no, I didn’t pack any. We’re thinking about making a stop for something though. We’re making good enough time that I think we’ll reach Cranefish Cove soon enough for Katara to heal you.” ‘Assuming she’s there already’ went unsaid. “Besides, Yaron wants us to let him off at Shu Jing anyway.”

“Why the fuck is Yaron still here?” Zuko asked flatly.

“Oh, you’re gonna love this,” Smellerbee informed him from the doorway. “In all the commotion with you falling off the ship and giving everyone a damn heart attack, Yaron accidentally punched Admiral Asshole in the face.”

“If you were describing anyone other than Yaron, I wouldn’t believe you.”

Ty Lee laughed lightly. “Yeah, he’s unique, to say the least. I don’t know how he’s gonna survive out there, but he says he’s got some friends on Shu Jing, so that’s where we’re stopping to drop him off and pick up supplies.”

“Friends on Shu Jing,” Zuko mused. “Hey! I’ve got one of those too.”

Smellerbee snorted. “You, a friend?”

Zuko threw a pillow at her, missed, and heard a shattering noise that he was too sleepy to investigate. Neither Ty Lee nor Smellerbee seemed particularly alarmed, so it was probably fine. “Master Piandao.”

“Oh, Master Piandao!” Sokka appeared in the doorway.

“What, did we summon you by saying his name?” Smellerbee mocked.

“Wha – No! I was just passing by! Shut up!”

“He’s pretty obsessed,” Smellerbee relayed to Zuko, leaning forward conspiratorially. “I never knew he had a thing for old guys – “

There was another loud shattering noise, so Zuko, suddenly becoming aware that his eyes were closed, quickly opened them. All of a sudden, both Smellerbee and Sokka had ruffled hair and slightly displaced clothes. “That was a quick fight,” he mused.

“It really wasn’t,” Ty Lee advised him idly. “I think you should go back to bed and get some sleep, Zuko.”

Zuko hummed in response and was about to do so when he remembered something. “Wait! We should visit Master Piandao when we get to Shu Jing.” That was what he meant to say, but judging by everyone’s bemused faces, he had not expressed that quite so clearly.

“I have no idea what he just said,” Smellerbee announced. “Anyone else? No? Cool.”

Zuko grumbled something unintelligible and flopped over in his bed. He would probably wake up again before they reached Shu Jing, so he could just tell them then.

Contrary to his sleep-influenced thoughts, Zuko did not wake up again over the four-day trip to Shu Jing. At least, not distinctly enough to simultaneously recall something important and convey information comprehensibly. He spent the four-day trip in a blurry haze of dizziness, coughing, fever dreams, and exhaustion. When he finally woke up feeling vaguely aware, his room was covered in the pale blue light of early dawn. He pushed his covers off and sat upright, groggy but mostly coherent. Someone slept on the other bed in the cabin, so Zuko took care to stand and exit as quietly as possible. At least, he stood with that intention. An unexpectedly sharp pain blazed through his left shin, causing him to stumble backwards onto his bed with a hiss. That still might not have been enough to wake someone who hadn’t fallen asleep thinking anxious thoughts of Zuko, but Sokka was not that someone.

“Zuko! Hey, buddy, let me help you.”

Sokka’s voice was so infuriatingly gentle that Zuko had no choice other than to push his hands away half-heartedly and get right back to standing up on his own while asserting, “I can walk on my own,” on principle.

“I’m sure you probably could,” Sokka agreed mildly, “no matter what else was going on, but you shouldn’t have to, and you don’t have to.” When Zuko hesitated in his actions but still did not invite help, Sokka continued, “Zuko, this is the first time you’ve even tried to get up since you nearly drowned. I haven’t stopped worrying about you for four days straight. I know you’re an independent kind of person, but could you just let me have this? Please?” He was so earnest that Zuko felt morally obligated to accept his help, so Zuko wrapped his left arm around him and let Sokka half-guide, half-lift him back off of his bed, diligently leaving both Sokka’s blinding smile and his own flushed cheeks unheeded and unmentioned. “Where to, buddy?” Sokka chirped.

Zuko thought, briefly, that he might need to hurt Sokka if he called Zuko ‘buddy’ one more time, but then he reminded himself of what Sokka had just said and did not hurt Sokka. “Kitchen?”

“Sure thing. We’ll be there in no time!”

They did actually arrive there pretty quickly. It occurred to Zuko that as a lifelong older brother and the inadvertent co-guardian of two young teens, Sokka probably had experience as a human cane. Sokka settled Zuko at a chair at the kitchen table and went to get some unfamiliar tea brewing despite Zuko’s insistence that he was quite fine with just water. Meanwhile, Zuko watched Sokka work while contemplating his own state of mind. The conversation with Smellerbee had left him feeling much lighter. It had been – he hated to use the word ‘validating’ because it implied he was someone who needed validation and he didn’t like to think of himself that way. Affirming, maybe. He thought that maybe he was in the right place to have a similar conversation with Sokka.

“Hey, Sokka,” he said as Sokka set the tea on the table and sat across from him.

“Yeah?”

The internal commitment he’d made left him breathless in the face of the arduous task ahead of him, and his unsteady heartbeat made him feel unusually light-headed, like he had the world’s most nerve-wracking adrenaline rush. That might have been due to pneumonia, though, come to think of it. He soldiered on. “Sokka, I was abused.”

There was silence just long enough for Zuko to begin to feel uneasy, and then – “Zuko, I am so glad you feel comfortable enough to tell me that.”

“…Oh,” Zuko replied at length. Then he physically recoiled. “Oh, Agni, no. Are you – Are you crying?”

“I’m just – “ Sokka paused to sniffle and wipe his eyes, “I’m just so proud of you – !”

“I’m never telling you anything ever again,” Zuko decided disgustedly.

“It’s time for a hug!” Sokka launched forward and slammed into Zuko, giving him what might have been a very nice hug if it weren’t for the fact that Sokka was so gooey and emotional.

Suki stepped gingerly into view, giving them a laughably bewildered look. “Why is Sokka crying?”

“I honestly don’t know,” Zuko attested, returning Sokka’s hug all the same.

Suki hummed. “I guess it has been a pretty emotional week. Anyway, we’re about to head out. I’m assuming both of you are coming since this stop is specifically for the two of you.”

It took Zuko several heartbeats to register her meaning. “Oh, we’re at Shu Jing!” Then he frowned. “I thought we were here for Yaron?”

“Sorry, you missed him. He left yesterday. Oh, but he did leave some soup for you upon finding out you were the banished Prince Zuko and has highly recommended himself a potential Royal Chef if you ever find yourself becoming Fire Lord. It’s very good, and healthy, particularly for you.”

“I’ll heat it right now!” Sokka volunteered, releasing Zuko and dashing off.

“I can heat it myself,” Zuko pointed out, more bemused than anything else.

Suki shook her head. “Ty Lee said just about one of the worst things you could do right now is bend. I’m serious, Zuko,” she warned when Zuko snorted disparagingly. “You could do real, permanent damage to yourself by bending right now. You’ll be over your pneumonia soon, I’m sure.”

Zuko wrinkled his nose. “How can you know that?”

“First,” Sokka began as the soup was reheated on the stove, “that soup is packed with all kinds of pneumonia cures – sorry, ‘recovery boosters,’ and this fern-grease tea is supposed to be super helpful.”

“Fern-grease,” Zuko repeated. That didn’t sound nearly appetizing enough to be the tea he was currently drinking.

“Second, you’re a thousand times more lucid right now than you have been in days, so that’s a pretty big hint.”

“That still doesn’t mean – “

“Third,” Sokka cut him off, leaning forward with the biggest smirk he’d ever worn, “guess what you were sucking on last night?”

Sokka blanched as soon as the words left his mouth. Suki released an inhuman screech and began attacking Sokka with a broom. “You can’t say those things to people! Especially not sick, injured people who are basically dating the guy who’s basically your brother! What’s wrong with you?!”

“It was an accident!” Sokka shrieked, dodging the broom. “I swear! I didn’t mean to – The answer is a frozen toad! A frozen toad, okay?!”

Zuko slowly set the teacup down, rested both hands palm-up on the table, and faceplanted.

“Never - speak - again!” Suki shouted, continuing her savage, merciless assault.

“Hey guys, what the fuck did I just hear?” Smellerbee asked revoltedly as she entered the kitchen, followed closely by an appalled entourage consisting of Ty Lee, Wishi, and Haki.

“I regret everything,” Sokka moaned from his position face-down on the floor, seemingly resigned to his fate. Suki still had yet to cease her revenge on behalf of Zuko’s ears.

A couple hours later, when they had all eaten and mostly recovered from that universally mortifying experience, they marched up the path to Piandao’s house. Wishi and Haki remained behind to watch the ship, and Zuko was using the wooden crutch that the group had picked up for him in the marketplace the day before. They were still several feet from the house when the door burst open, and Zuko found himself in a hug so tight he was practically lifted off of his feet. “You’re alive!” Toph shouted. “What are you even doing here?!”

Zuko entertained the idea that this was another fever dream before determining that Toph’s hug hurt too much for it to be a dream. A wave of giddiness swept through the whole group, so thick it was nearly tangible. “You – what are you doing here?” he echoed, hugging her back just as tightly with his right arm while the left one still clung to his crutch. “We thought you guys would be at Cranefish Cove!”

“We came here to stay with Master Piandao and Uncle Iroh until it was time to meet up,” Aang supplied hoarsely from a couple feet behind Toph, smiling weakly. Zuko saw his own disbelieving euphoria reflected on Aang’s face.

Just behind Aang, Katara stared wide-eyed for several moments before she fell onto her knees and burst into tears. “I thought you were dead,” she sobbed. Sokka ran forward and knelt before he was done moving, scraping his knees on the concrete as he threw himself at her in one of the most violent hugs Zuko had ever witnessed.

Longshot stepped forward, his gaze glassy and focused on Smellerbee. They stumbled into each other’s arms, burying their faces in each other’s shoulders.

“Toph, let go already,” Aang laughed wetly after hugging Suki and Sokka, when Toph had been attached to Zuko for what he deemed to be long enough.

“No,” Toph mumbled into Zuko’s chest. “I’m not going anywhere. You can just hug us both.”

Aang grinned and darted forward, fitting himself neatly into the space under Zuko’s right shoulder. Zuko’s chest was too constricted to be good for him, but it was a nice kind of constricted, the ‘this is too good to be true’ kind of constricted. “I missed you so much,” Aang whispered.

Zuko was not an ‘I missed you, too’ type of person, but he tried to communicate the feeling by pulling Aang even closer to him (and consequently Toph). Aang clung more tightly to them both, apparently unbothered by his silence.

Longshot pushed half-heartedly at Toph’s shoulder. When she didn’t budge, he shrugged and replaced Zuko’s crutch with his shoulder, wrapping himself around both him and Toph on Zuko’s left.

Zuko raised an eyebrow questioningly at Katara, who watched with an indulgent, elated smile. She giggled and shook her head. “I’m not joining that mess,” she promised him. “I wouldn’t even be able to reach you. I’ll just wait my turn, thanks.”

“Is anyone gonna ask why Zuko’s crazy sister’s crazy friend is here, or are we just accepting that?” Toph asked the group in general.

That successfully pried Aang and Longshot away from Zuko so that they could scowl menacingly at Ty Lee, weirdly in sync.

“To be honest, I’m more concerned about Zuko’s left leg,” Katara divulged.

Longshot looked down at Zuko’s leg, then back at him, almost comically alarmed. By all appearances, he had not even noticed Zuko’s crutch as he’d tossed it to the ground in favor of hugging him.

“Can someone tell me where Jet is first?” Smellerbee proposed warily.

Panic seized Zuko’s chest before he’d even fully registered her words. The sadness that crossed Katara’s face was far from reassuring. “He’s… okay,” she promised. “He’s just not with us. We split a couple weeks ago.”

The previously rapturous atmosphere was chased away by a sense of foreboding. “Why don’t we sit down together and answer each other’s questions?” Sokka suggested. “I still want to say hi to Master Piandao again, anyway.”

“Okay, but just so you know, he’s out right now. Plus, I still haven’t gotten my hug,” Katara pointed out humorously, easing the tension.

“Fine, fine,” Toph grumbled, letting go of Zuko and stepping backwards.

Katara slid her right arm carefully under Zuko’s left shoulder and carefully pulled him into her arms, holding him tightly but gently. Zuko realized for the first time that he had never actually hugged her before. As it so happened, Katara gave even better hugs than Sokka did.

Following said hug, all of them traipsed into the home. Katara explained that they’d had to part ways with the main fleet two weeks ago, and that Jet had stayed to continue collecting Freedom Fighters and other fighters to join the invasion. Everyone was particularly cagey about the reason why, and there were more important matters at hand, so Zuko and the rest unanimously, silently agreed to let it drop for the time being.

“Up until a week ago, Aang saw visions of you regularly,” Katara confessed. Zuko flinched at the implications, and Aang looked away from them. “Then they just… stopped, all of a sudden. We thought…”

No one finished that sentence.

Sokka promptly began explaining how Ty Lee had hunted them down and brought them to Zuko. Then he listed the various ailments that Zuko was currently afflicted with, finishing with, “You still have the magic spirit water, right?”

“Right. But I may as well try to use regular waterbending first.”

They headed back outside, because Piandao did not approve of bending in his home. Zuko remembered that rule fondly from his own days of training, although he rather doubted the rule would have applied to waterbending, especially when used for healing. Ty Lee, who was at the front of their group, stopped dead in the open doorway with a sharp inhalation. “…Uncle Iroh?”

Iroh and Piandao stood on the other side. Iroh appeared equally shocked. "Ty Lee?" His gaze locked onto Zuko's own gaze and flew wide. Ty Lee stepped aside, and Iroh slowly walked towards Zuko and reached for his face with trembling hands. "Zuko," he breathed, horror etched across his face as he took in Zuko's newest scar. Then Iroh embraced him. Zuko melted against him, pressing his face into Iroh's shoulder and embracing Iroh in turn. Iroh didn't let him go for a long time, and when he finally did, it was to part just enough to lightly palm Zuko's right cheek. "What did she do to you?" he whispered, anguished. He turned to Katara. "Is there anything - ?"

"That's what I was about to find out," Katara answered softly.

Iroh nodded firmly. "Right. Thank you, Katara."

"Of course," Katara replied, startled.

Iroh turned to Ty Lee and, to everyone's surprise, including Ty Lee's, hugged her as well.

After her initial shock passed, Ty Lee hugged him back just as tightly, sniffling. "I thought you were dead," she murmured, then pulled away. "You were dead and all I had left was this thing - " She reached into her robes and retrieved - a... white lotus Pai Sho tile?

“What?!” Sokka exploded. “You had – You had a – If you’d just told me that to start with, I would have believed you from the beginning!”

Ty Lee glanced back and forth between Sokka and Iroh, flabbergasted. “Is this… significant?”

“Significant,” Sokka echoed incredulously, his voice far higher than it normally was.

“While you're discussing that,” Suki interjected, “we’re going outside to get Zuko off of that crutch.”

Sokka fell silent, a little sheepish.

As all of them trooped towards a nearby brook, Piandao fell into step beside Zuko and rested a hand lightly on his shoulder. “It’s good to see that you’re okay, for the most part,” he said quietly. “When Aang’s visions ceased, all of us feared the worst.” He glanced at Sokka, who walked beside Zuko, and raised his voice to a normal volume. “I had the pleasure of teaching Sokka a few tricks when he and the others visited us at the Eastern Air Temple, and I must say, you did an excellent job of teaching him what I taught you. He’s become quite the swordsman.” Both Zuko and Sokka preened under his rare praise.

Katara instructed Zuko to take a seat near the brook, so Sokka helped him sit without further hurting his leg. Then Katara got to work. The remnants of pneumonia were quickly chased away. The infection in his leg was trickier, but impressively, she was able to heal that too, leaving him more clear-headed and pain-free than he’d felt for over a month.

“Wait, but that means you still have your spirit water,” Smellerbee exclaimed. “So….” She looked meaningfully towards the right side of Zuko’s face in particular.

Katara pulled a blue vial out of her bag. “Are you ready, Zuko?”

Zuko nodded firmly. “I guess we’ll find out exactly how powerful it is.”

Just seconds later, colors suddenly burst into being as his vision transformed into a landscape view. Zuko jerked backwards in shock, his right eye flying wide open.

“Did I hurt you?” Katara yelped in alarm.

“It worked.” Zuko cackled, sheer glee rendering him borderline hysterical. “It actually worked!”

The group cheered as Katara stored the rest of her spirit water within the blue vial and tackled Zuko in a second, celebratory hug.

“You can see, Katara can cure blindness, and I am, and I quote, ‘quite the swordsman!’” Sokka whooped. “The Fire Nation better look out!”

Chapter Text

Behind every door
Is a fall, a fall
And no one's here to sleep

No One's Here to Sleep by Naughty Boy & Bastille

Act III: The Prince

Chapter 16: Behind Every Door

Zuko and Aang sat facing each other on a rocky outcrop, both of them cross-legged. “Are you ready?” Zuko asked.

Aang nodded firmly. “Yeah. I’ve got this.”

“Good.” Zuko waited until Aang had closed his eyes, then closed his own eyes too. He cleared his mind until the only thing he felt was his own chi burning within him, isolating himself from all of his emotions and attachments. Then he reached out with it. Aang’s chi was waiting on the other side, air and water and earth and fire all at the same time. His own chi shone more brightly in response as he anchored Aang’s chi to his own internal tranquility. There was nothing left to do besides meditate on their chi, patiently maintaining the connection as Aang’s attention was drawn elsewhere. Soon, a brilliant blue glow hit Zuko’s eyelids, and he opened them to see Aang’s tattoos emanating that glow.

“You did it,” he congratulated.

Aang’s eyes flew wide open, gleaming with the same color, and if Aang’s smiles were typically radiant, this one was almost blindingly so, even without the glow. “I did,” Aang agreed, more serenely than anything else. He looked… older, somehow. Probably due to the weight of all those past Avatars hitting him a little harder while he was linked to them.

Zuko could not possibly hope to match the intensity of Aang’s smile at any time, let alone while he was literally incandescent. Still, he gave it his best effort, rejoicing in Aang’s success.

Aang went bright red, and the light sputtered out, leaving him as a normal teen once more.

“What happened?” Sokka demanded. “You were – You were glow-y! And you stayed glow-y for a whole minute!”

“I – I – “ Aang looked wildly back and forth between Zuko and Sokka. “Zuko can’t smile anymore, okay?!”

“…What?!” Sokka shrieked. One of his eyes was twitching. Beside him, Toph doubled over, guffawing. “What do you mean, Zuko can’t smile anymore?!” Sokka continued, outraged.

“I’m not talking about this,” Aang decided, getting redder and redder by the second.

“Do you know what kind of effort I have put into making him smile more often?” Smellerbee put in, crossing her arms and visibly stifling a smirk.

“He can smile any other time!” Aang appealed. “Just not when I’m in the Avatar State!”

Suki massaged her temples, casting her gaze skyward. “What if he just doesn’t smile at you?” she suggested exasperatedly. “Could he just… look away when he smiles?”

Zuko, for his part, was utterly lost. Even Longshot was smirking knowingly, although he was directing his smirk at Zuko, silently enjoying his confusion.

Aang glared at the ground between him and Zuko, clearly frustrated. “We can try that,” he mumbled.

“I’ll do you one better,” Toph volunteered. She stomped on the ground, and suddenly the ground beneath Zuko jerked itself into the air, twisted around, and slammed back down.

“Could you not?” Zuko snapped breathlessly.

Toph snickered. She, Zuko thought resentfully, is so lucky that I like her.

Zuko returned to his previous state of meditation with some difficulty caused by the sudden adrenaline rush, but not enough to be a significant impediment. After a few moments, Suki announced, “Okay, Aang is back in the Avatar State. Let’s keep going. And Zuko, for the love of the spirits, don’t turn around.” Zuko opened his eyes and stood. Maintaining distance between himself and his earthly attachments while also maintaining distance between the positive and negative energy within him was like walking on a tightrope, but the time spent staying with Piandao and, more important, Iroh had undeniably improved his spiritual balance. “Toph, Katara, Longshot, you’re Group A, and you’ll fight Zuko. Sokka, Smellerbee, Ty Lee, and Haki, you’re Group B, and you’re fighting Aang.”

“Don’t forget to keep your eyes closed, Twinkle Toes!” Toph put in, smirking. “Just because I’m not fighting you doesn’t mean I can’t tell!”

Zuko readied himself in a fighting stance, and his four opponents mimicked him, prepared with their respective weapons. Toph attacked first, and he wove between the rapidly-forming columns of earth as they shot up around him. Then Katara lashed out with a water whip that wrapped around his left wrist, tugging him in the direction of a rising earth pillar. He leapt over it directly into one of Longshot’s arrows, which he set aflame hot enough to burn down before it reached him.

“Good work, guys! All of you are doing great. Group B, keep it up. Group A, focus on me. Zuko, your job is to protect me.”

Zuko turned his water-handcuff to steam and moved closer to Suki. Three arrows went right for her right as Katara sent several ice spikes flying at her left. Zuko put his weight on his left foot and shot fire from his right foot and his left hand with his torso horizontally blocking Suki, burning both the arrows and the spikes. From that position, he bent his left knee and shifted weight onto his left hand while kicking fire between Suki’s legs with his left foot. It hit the boulder coming for Suki’s back and broke it into pieces that sailed past her.

“So far, so good. Group A, move to target practice. Group B, you’re on me now. Aang, guard me.”

Zuko slipped into a lightningbending stance and internally connected to the positive and negative energy within him. Some of it had become entangled once more during the fight, so he quickly drew them apart while using fire on the boulders, arrows, and ice discs that came at him from all sides. Once they were thoroughly dislodged from one other, he dropped onto his his hands and set the world around him on fire with his feet. This distraction gave him time to go through the hand motions of lightning generation. When the attacks resumed, he released the energies and let them collide deep inside him, sending small blue sparks to his fingertips. He expressed the discarnate explosion by shocking every projectile that came for him. Like the chaotic and anarchistic spirit she was, Toph broke from the agreed-upon plan and ceased her aerial onslaught early, and rode a wave of rock on a beeline for him. That sent him diving out of the way, instinctively knocking her off of her feet with a short blast while losing his grip on the remainder of his electricity. He was forced to release it directly into the sky in a powerful, aimless, wasteful blow, but resolutely did not allow it to affect his peace of mind. Instead, he took in the frustration like a breath and let it go in one seamless, internal transition, replacing the lightning with flames. Meanwhile, Toph maintained her balance even as she was struck down and landed solidly on her feet, hardly missing a beat in the barrage.

“Nice one, Zuko and Toph! The eclipse has arrived, and firebending is temporarily impossible – that goes for you too, Aang. Everyone, keep going!”

Zuko drew his blades, which Sokka had given back upon making his own sword at Piandao’s home. Katara drove a stream of water into the ground, where it froze upon impact and crept swiftly towards him. Clearly she had saved one of her most difficult moves to combat without bending for this phase of the exercise. Swords had minimal impact on this approach, so Zuko reluctantly took to distancing himself from the ice as fast as possible. At the same time, Toph charged him from the opposite direction, equipped with her earth armor, and Longshot targeted both Zuko and the space between him and his two incoming obstacles, shooting off five arrows rapid fire.

Zuko waited until the last moment, then jumped backwards onto the ice that had already formed behind him. He used the momentum from sliding on the ice to escape Toph, the arrows, and Katara’s own attempts to capture his feet. Toph followed him still, carried on a rock wave that broke up the ice on the ground as she neared him. The sound of ice shattering behind him prompted him to dodge to his left, leaving the ice and slicing with his swords through the arrows that awaited him there. A glance over his shoulder revealed both Toph’s relentless trajectory towards him and the rock wall she had tried to trap him with.

“Last part! Firebending is back on. Zuko, Aang, move to your designated locations. Everyone else, follow your designated opponent. Continue your assault.”

Zuko sheathed his weapons and took off, using fire as both a propellant and a buffer against attacks from behind. Reaching his destination was simple. Keeping his connection with Aang was less so. Still, he worked hard to maintain it while defending himself until he felt the connection suddenly fade. If training was over, Suki was meant to send a signal to Toph through a series of thumps against the ground at her location. Since there had been no signal, he could only assume they were meant to continue. Soon the connection resumed, and shortly after, Toph called out, “I just felt the signal!”

The four of them ceased their fighting and returned to camp, where Suki and the others met them. “Were you able to stay in the Avatar State for the whole fight?” Katara asked Aang.

“Yep!” Aang beamed. “I only left the Avatar State at the end, and then I was able to get back in, too.”

“Great. Now let’s talk battle plans,” Sokka interjected.

“Aren’t we waiting for the rest of the invasion to get here?” Haki asked.

“Not for this part. I planned out a buddy system with our three benders, two chi-blockers, and five nonbending non-chi-blocking fighters,” Sokka revealed. “Not counting Aang, of course. That way we can keep track of each other during the fight.” He retrieved some parchment from his bag. “I’ve got Katara with Longshot, Toph with me, Zuko with Smellerbee – “

“I don’t like this plan,” Toph objected.

“Of course you don’t,” Sokka sighed.

“I should rightfully be with Zuko – “

“You’re both benders,” Sokka cut her off.

“Hear me out though! For one, I am the only person in this group who never got to travel with Zuko.”

“Uh, I never traveled with Zuko,” Katara pointed out.

“He chased you all over the Earth Kingdom. That’s close enough. Anyway, my second point is that I can literally feel Zuko’s heartbeat at all times. If anyone’s keeping an eye on him, it’s gonna be me.”

“The buddy system isn’t just so someone can keep an eye on me.” Zuko was answered with silence. “…It’s not, right?” he growled at Sokka.

“It… has multiple benefits,” Sokka hedged, and before Zuko could argue, Sokka pressed on, “Toph is right, actually. Hang on, let me rearrange things a bit – okay, so you two will be together, Smellerbee will join Katara and Longshot, and I’ll join Suki and Jet. And the last group is Ty Lee and Haki.” Wishi was not with them; she had departed with Piandao and Iroh to help the White Lotus take back Ba Sing Se.

“Are we done now?” Toph implored.

“That’s it until everyone else gets here,” Sokka confirmed.

“Sweet. I’m gonna go tear up that old warship and use it for metalbending now that we’re done using it.” Without further preamble, Toph summoned yet another rock wave and rode it down to the shore.

“We should follow her,” Katara told Zuko. “I want to have one last healing session before the invasion.”

“I don’t think that’s necessary,” Zuko protested, but followed her nonetheless.

They reached the shore at a much more sedate pace and beyond sharing a mildly concerned but mostly disturbed glance, dutifully ignored Toph’s mad cackling from the nearby warship. Katara spent several minutes working on his right arm before letting the water splash back into the ocean and sitting back with a resentful huff. “I’m sorry, Zuko. I think that’s there to stay.”

Zuko raised his right arm and observed the red, wrinkled scar that climbed all the way from his elbow to his fingertips. “It’s alright, Katara,” he reassured her. “It’s not your fault.”

Katara tensed her jaw as she glared at his arm. “I could… use my spirit water, maybe,” she mentioned. “I still have some left.”

“Save it for something else,” he dismissed. “If someone gets hit in the face with a fireball, we’ll have bigger concerns than scars.”

Katara peered over his shoulder and frowned. “I hope that fog won’t delay the invasion….”

As she and Zuko made their way up the hill to their friends, the fog grew darker and darker until Zuko noticed the shapes that had formed under the cover of the fog. “They’re here,” he realized as the bow of a ship broke through.

Katara turned and brightened immediately when she laid eyes on her father leading a small fleet right to them. “You’re right!” She turned again to face their camp. “GUYS! THEY’RE HERE!” she shouted and raced back down the hill toward the ships.

Zuko followed her, keeping his eyes peeled for Jet. Smellerbee and Longshot soon caught up with him, and they waited on the shore together, each of them scanning the incoming reinforcements with trepidation. Longshot jostled both of them and pointed; following his finger, Zuko and Smellerbee spotted Jet on one of the ships in the back, but he hadn’t yet spotted them.

He still had not spotted them even as the ship he was on came nearer and nearer to the bay. Finally, as the ship docked on the beach, Jet looked up, and his gaze lit up when it landed on them. Beside Zuko, Smellerbee gasped excitedly as the bows lowered and people began flooding out. “The Duke! Pipsqueak! Longshot, he found Freedom Fighters!”

Zuko intended to follow Smellerbee and Longshot over to introduce himself to whatever Freedom Fighters Jet had managed to gather and to reunite with Jet, but his attention was pulled away by a small group of people coming down from a ship on his other side. “You guys?” he said, startled.

Xaoheng, one of Zuko’s swordfighting pupils from Lee’s village, mock-saluted him. “Sela and Lee send their best,” he offered.

“I can’t believe you guys are here,” Zuko replied, shaking his head as he walked over.

“I can’t believe I learned to swordfight from the Prince of the Fire Nation,” Xaoheng answered in kind.

Zuko had hardly gotten the chance to greet his old students when Jet was pulling him away from them, calling, “Sorry guys, you can have him later! Right now, he’s ours!”

“It’s good to see you, Jet,” Zuko offered uncertainly as Jet continued dragging him off.

Jet stopped halfway between Zuko’s students and the Freedom Fighters to hug him. “Don’t ever do that again.”

“Er… do what?”

“Use yourself as bait.” Jet let go and scowled at him, worry and ire mingling in his expression. “That should be a last resort, not a normal thing to do, which it apparently is for you.”

Zuko frowned. “I don’t do it that often.”

Jet didn’t get a chance to respond, because they reached the group of kids and teens hovering around Smellerbee and Longshot. There were about fifteen or so ranging from children several years younger than Toph to teens about Jet and Zuko’s age. “Everyone, this is Zuko,” Jet announced. “He’s our newest Freedom Fighter, and when we win today, he’s going to become the new Fire Lord.” This didn’t come as a surprise to any of them, so Jet must have already briefed them on Zuko and his background before they had arrived. Then Jet rattled off several names to Zuko as he introduced him to the other Freedom Fighters.

After that, Zuko got passed around by every member of Team Avatar, because apparently everyone wanted to meet the teenager they were about to put on the throne. At some point Toph broke in with, “Zuko, you gotta meet these people, you’re gonna love them – “ and then he found himself herded into a cave. “The strategy meeting is in a bit, so I’ll come get you for that. In the meantime, I figured you could use some downtime away from all of those people.”

“That sounds great,” Zuko agreed, already beginning to relax a little more. “Thanks, Toph.”

He took the gifted time to decompress from all the talking and mentally prepare himself for even more talking before the actual invasion.

Later on, the nine members of their inner circle and Hakoda converged on the outskirts of their makeshift army, debating who would present the battle plan. “It would help if one of you could present it,” Hakoda pointed out, “since they’ll be following you during the attack. That way they can start seeing you as the leaders of this endeavor more than me.”

“Suki has the most experience leading an organized group like this,” Aang pointed out.

“Unfortunately, I think they’re more likely to listen to Jet than they are to me,” Suki countered critically, “since they’ve all known him longer and he was the one to collect them all.”

“I don’t know the plan as well as you do. I wouldn’t be able to present it as well as you could.”

Suki nodded at Jet’s words and turned a thoughtful eye on Sokka. “You came up with it, Sokka. You know it better than anybody.”

“You think I should be presenting it?” Sokka asked nervously. “I mean, yeah! Yeah, I can do that. No problem.”

It was a problem. Sokka slunk sheepishly back towards them after Suki’s hasty intervention and watched with them as she delivered a motivational speech alongside the battle strategy. Afterwards, Sokka walked away with his head hanging low. “I’ll be back,” Aang murmured, darting after him.

“You, there!” A man with a pair of glasses and a large bald spot ran towards them, or more specifically, towards Longshot. “You are the archer Sokka wrote to me about, yes?”

Longshot nodded warily.

“Perfect! I have some very interesting arrows that I designed for you to use today – “

Longshot’s eyes widened and zeroed in on the strange man, and Longshot readily followed him to his boat with Smellerbee at his heel.

“Listen, Zuko,” Jet started as the rest of their group dispersed, “I’m not telling you not to put us above you, because I know I could never put myself above any of you. But promise you’re not gonna go out of your way to die for us. I’m counting on seeing you again after this fight.”

Zuko felt, personally, that it was a mistake to count on seeing any particular individual after a deciding battle like this one would be. Then he tried to imagine never seeing any one of his friends again and empathized with Jet a bit more. “I’m going to make it out of this,” he promised, even though he couldn’t realistically promise that. “We all will.”

Jet grinned triumphantly at him. “That’s the spirit.” He clapped him on the shoulder. “I think it’s about time to get to our respective boats. Sokka told me I’m with him, Suki, the Kyoshi Warriors who came from her island, and a handful of others.”

“I’m with Toph and the people you brought from the village in the plains. And some others, probably.” He hadn’t really been paying attention

Jet nodded. “That makes sense. You made some damn good fighters out of them, by the way. How did that happen?”

“I was bored,” Zuko replied, an entirely authentic answer that he only realized after speaking it would probably come across as cocky.

“Right. Remind me to get the whole story out of you some time.” The two of them exchanged farewells and parted ways.

Zuko was heading for his own ship when footsteps pounded on the ground behind him. “Zuko – hey, Zuko, wait up!” He stopped and turned. Ty Lee skidded to a halt in front of him. “Zuko, I’m sorry.”

“This doesn’t seem like the time for an apology,” Zuko said mildly.

Ty Lee shrugged, one side of her lips sliding higher on her face in half of a rueful and self-deprecating smile. “Longshot is still on the wrong boat learning about his new arrows. I – I thought I should say it now, while there’s still time.” Zuko shifted back and forth between his feet. He didn’t even want to think about what she was apologizing for, but she was right, so he stayed put to listen and gave no further protests. “I wish I had never helped Azula with any of the things I helped her with this year. Every single thing that I let her do was utterly despicable, but especially what I let her do to you.”

“To be fair,” Zuko opined wryly, noting some factual inaccuracy in her apology, “I don’t think anyone ‘lets’ Azula do anything.”

Ty Lee snorted. “Yeah, okay. But I still could have done something to get in her way. I could have put even the smallest effort into preventing her from taking you. Instead I helped. I’ll never forgive myself for that. I know there’s not anything I can do to take back what I already did – there’s no amount of good that can outweigh that kind of bad – but I want you to know that I’m going to try anyway. Even if I can’t make things right, I’m going to find a way to make them right anyway. I’m gonna do whatever it takes.”

“…Thank you, Ty Lee,” Zuko replied, accepting her words. “I don’t know that I can forgive you yet, but… I have to believe that people can do bad things and still become good. I’ve done bad things, too. After we win today, there’s going to be practically a whole nation of people who have done terrible, terrible things. I’m counting on them to try to become good people afterwards. I’m sure not everyone is going to manage it, but if anyone can, it’s going to be the two of us.”

“You’re already good, Zuko,” Ty Lee promised. “But I’m not going to let you down.”

“Good,” Zuko approved. “And for the record, I definitely won’t ever forgive you if you don’t make it out of this.”

“Understood.”

Once everyone was situated in their submarines, and said submarines had detached from their boats and resurfaced on the other side of the Gates of Azulon, Zuko helped Toph climb up to the top of theirs as she chanted, “I hate this, I hate this, I hate this – ” Of the other two submarines that had surfaced right alongside them, Sokka, Suki, and Jet were on one while Katara, Smellerbee, and Longshot were on the other. Aang pulled Appa up to the surface as well. “Hey, guys,” he said, nervous but determined energy filling the air surrounding all nine of them – well, eleven counting Appa and Momo.

“Zuko, when you’re Fire Lord, my first request as nobility is for you to fill the ocean with earth,” Toph declared.

“Toph, you have no idea how badly I would like to fulfill that request,” Zuko told her earnestly. “Unfortunately, I don’t think that’s feasible…. Also, and this is much more important, Katara will murder us both.”

“I’m not afraid of Sweetness,” Toph scoffed.

“Uh, I am,” Smellerbee interjected. “Anyone else see her bloodbend a few days ago, or was I the only one there for that?” That was a rhetorical question, of course. All of them had been there, and it had been absolutely terrifying.

“…Bloodbending,” Jet echoed uneasily. Oh, right. He hadn’t been there. “That sounds great and not at all unnerving.”

“Only on the full moon. But yeah, pretty unnerving,” Sokka commiserated.

“We don’t have a lot of time, guys,” Katara interjected, although she was smirking just a little. “We all know where we’re meeting, right?”

A chorus of confirmations answered her.

“Okay. One last hug for the road – “

“If you think I’m getting into that mess of a group hug, you’ve got another think coming,” Toph rejected passionately. “I will give one hug to Twinkle Toes, because he’s about to fight a scary dude, and then I’m staying away.”

“I get a hug from Toph!” Aang squeaked excitedly. “I never get hugs from Toph and she gives the best hugs – no offense guys!”

“No offense taken, but you are actually incorrect, sir,” Sokka informed him pompously, “because I give the best hugs, as decreed by the future Fire Lord himself during his brief period of wakefulness in the midst of being sedated.”

Katara rolled her eyes. “Sure, Sokka.”

“I am so serious right now. Back me up here, guys.”

Zuko exchanged glances with Suki and Smellerbee. “…I never said that.”

“I never heard it,” Smellerbee put forth.

“Me either,” Suki agreed.

Sokka’s jaw dropped. “Betrayal,” he uttered, sounding as heartbroken as Zuko had ever heard him. “Even you, Suki, light of my life?”

Suki shrugged innocently.

“I swear this happened,” Sokka insisted.

Toph’s hug with Aang had ended by that point, so Toph stepped out of range as Zuko crossed over to the submarine in the middle and got sandwiched between Sokka and Jet in a large group hug.

Hakoda poked his head out of the submarine they stood on top of and called to them, sounding vaguely amused but mostly fond and maybe a little wistful, “I hate to break up this meeting of the leaders, but it’s about time for us to get going again.”

“We’ll be right down,” Sokka promised, and Hakoda retreated into the submarine. Zuko sensed the atmosphere shift into something heavier, like the weight of their mission was landing abruptly on all of their shoulders at once. Sokka took a deep breath. “This is it, guys.”

Jet rubbed his hands together, lifting his chin and smirking so confidently that it silently shattered the tension before he’d even spoken. “Let’s give ‘em hell.”

Aang followed Zuko onto his own submarine and took his wrist in a loose grip. Even once everyone else had departed, he had not yet let go. Zuko got déjà vu as he remembered the last time Aang had pulled him aside right before parting ways. Of course, last time, Aang had followed him on his trip from Ba Sing Se to the Eastern Air Temple, so they’d not had to part ways after all. This time, that wasn’t possible. The distinction sat heavy in Zuko’s stomach. “I just wanted to say,” Aang started, “that I’m really, really glad you tried to kidnap me all those months ago.”

Zuko chuckled. “This isn’t exactly how I pictured entering the Fire Nation Capital with you at the beginning, but now I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’m really glad that I failed so many times.”

“I don’t think it matters,” Aang decided. “I think you would have changed your mind anyway and joined us no matter what happened.”

“You always did have more faith in me than I did,” Zuko remarked.

“I think all of us do,” Aang pointed out. “Maybe you should have more faith in yourself, too.”

Zuko dropped his head and looked down, unable to accept Aang’s unwavering faith in him.

Aang tugged at his right wrist, holding it gently. “Look at all you went through and what you’re throwing yourself into now. You don’t just become this person in a day or a month or a year. This is who you are, Zuko, who you’ve always been. This is your inner core, finally shining through everything that's happened to you. I just want to say..., I’m so proud of you, Zuko.”

Zuko’s head snapped up. He took in the serious look, the sincerity that shone from the other boy and felt a warm flush run through his body. The pulsing of his blood drowned out most of the sounds around him so that he almost missed what Aang was saying next.

“I wanted to tell you now,” Aang said firmly, “in case I don’t come back.”

Now Zuko really couldn’t hear anything else as his heart dropped into his stomach. “Don’t say that!” he protested, raising his voice over the roaring in his ears.

Before Zuko could recover his composure, Aang leaned forward and used his other hand to wrap around the back of Zuko’s neck, pulling him forward and down. Aang went up on his toes and brushed the gentlest of kisses across Zuko’s lips.

After a moment of stunned immobility, Zuko returned the pressure for just a second, and then he was watching Aang stride away from him. He didn’t find his voice, couldn’t get a handle on his thoughts as he watched Aang snap out his glider, leap into the air and soar away without a backward glance.

Zuko unconsciously reached up to touch his lips and whispered, “Please come back.”

He only looked away from Aang’s retreating form when Toph opened the top of the submarine and said cheekily, “Please don’t have a panic attack before the invasion. When I can feel your heart racing even through metal, that’s pretty bad. Also, it’s time to go!”

“Prince Zuko?”

Zuko opened his eyes, grimacing at the title. “Just Zuko.”

Kiph, one of his former disciples, stood before him. “Zuko, we’re about to reach shore. Toph instructed me to rouse you from your meditation when we got close enough.”

“Right. Thanks, Kiph.” Zuko got up and stretched, then went to check on Toph, who was slumped against a wall looking green. “How are you feeling?” seemed vastly inadequate, but he asked her the question anyway for lack of a more accurate one.

When she merely grunted in response, he looked askance at The Boulder and The Hippo, who sat beside her. “She’ll be okay when we reach shore,” Boulder promised.

“Has she… you know… a lot?” He pointed at the bucket in front of her rather than verbally reference throwing up.

“A couple times, yeah.”

“Make sure she has some water then before the attack starts. I don’t want her to get dehydrated right before fighting.”

“The Boulder will gladly do so, Prince Zuko.”

“It’s just Zuko, actually. But, um, thanks.”

Zuko approached the two waterbenders from the Foggy Swamp Tribe. “Are you two doing okay?” he queried. “It must be tiring to be waterbending something this large for so long. Anything I can do to help?”

“Nope,” one of them answered cheerfully. “This ain’t much different from bending the swamp water under our canoes back home. We’re fine. Thanks for asking though, Prince Zuko.”

“No, I’m… I’m just Zuko.” Zuko restrained himself from sighing and turned around to see his old pupils geared up and clustered together nearby, looking expectantly at him.

He was briefly worried they were waiting for him to say something when one stepped forward. “We just wanted to say that it’s an honor to fight beside you today, Prince Zuko. We’re really looking forward to seeing you lead the Fire Nation after today.”

…Well. Zuko didn’t have the heart to correct this one. “Thank you. I, uh, really appreciate it.”

They dispersed. Zuko turned back to the waterbender, a niggling suspicion on his mind. “…Do you happen to know why everyone is calling me Prince Zuko now?”

“That’s what Toph said to call you!”

Zuko sighed.

Soon, they were upon the shore. Zuko saw everyone to their respective tanks, then cleared space for them to get out. “Feeling any better?” he asked Toph, who had made her way to his side.

“I can feel the ground below us through the metal now, so I’ll be fine soon enough.”

As soon as the submarine opened up onto dry land, the tanks rolled forward. Zuko and Toph followed closely behind them, leading Zuko’s students and Toph’s earthbending friends into battle.

The first wave of opponents was tanks. Most tanks were torn open by earthbending before they got close, but a few slipped through the assault. A few well-timed and well-aimed blasts took out the firebenders attacking from within those few. Next, firebenders on rhinos began streaming down towards them. Zuko became temporarily occupied by deflecting attacks on his companions.

“Zuko, help me empty one of those tanks,” Toph said urgently.

“Sure.”

Rather than breaking the next tank that neared them, Toph merely halted it by bending the ground in front of it into a wall. Zuko propelled himself into the air with firebending and landed on the tank, soon joined by Toph who landed with a shower of rock fragments as her transportation broke apart in midair. She tore a hole on the tank’s surface big enough for them both to immediately drop inside and make quick work of the tank’s inhabitants.

“Now what?”

“Now do whatever it is people do in these things. I’ve got some metalbending to do.”

Once she had bent the earth wall back into the ground, Zuko obliged her, aiming the tank at all of the rhino-riding firebenders around them while maintaining a volley of fireballs through the window. “Are you almost done, Toph?” he shouted over his shoulder.

“Almost… there…. Okay, I’m done! Stop the tank!” Zuko stopped the tank. When he swung around to see what she had been up to, he found that she had stolen one of the soldiers’ bags and filled it with sharp metal projectiles. “They’ll never know what hit them,” she boasted. “Let’s get out of here!”

“Wait – I have a better idea.” Zuko pointed to the engine. “You can get that out of here without blowing it up, right?”

“Uh, duh.”

“Can you carve a few layers of metal off?”

Toph was practically vibrating with excitement. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

“Probably.”

Toph immediately got to work while Zuko drove them directly into the throng of firebenders ahead. When she finished, the two of them bent themselves out of the tank and into the air. Toph threw the engine much farther than he could have with her metalbending, Zuko shot fire at the thinnest part, and it exploded into flaming metal shards that went flying everywhere. They weren’t enough to take out the tank-riders, who retreated into their vehicles for safety, but they were enough to distract rhino-riders so Toph could pierce debilitating but nonlethal places like shoulders and knees with her new projectiles.

They continued their encroachment upon the Fire Nation. When they had successfully overrun the shore and begun breaching the capital city itself, Zuko spotted Aang in the sky. “That’s not good,” he muttered.

“What’s not good?” Toph questioned warily.

“Aang. He’s coming back.” Zuko patted her shoulder. “Come on, let’s see what’s going on. I’ll lead the way.”

He guided her to Aang’s destination, where Sokka, Suki, and Jet were waiting and Katara, Smellerbee, and Longshot were arriving. “Please tell me you’re here because the Fire Lord turned out to be a big wimp and you didn’t even need the eclipse to take him down,” Sokka pleaded.

Aang closed his glider, uncharacteristically bitter. “He wasn’t home. No one was. The entire palace city is abandoned.”

Jet swore. “They must have known,” he growled.

“How could they have found out?” Katara demanded in disbelief.

Smellerbee groaned. “Someone must have blabbed after Azula took Ba Sing Se. All the generals knew, and I think a couple of their subordinates did too.”

“There’s an underground bunker near the palace,” Zuko revealed, then added dismally, “but he wouldn’t have used it now that I’m with you guys since I know about it. So he must be somewhere else.”

“My instincts tell me he wouldn’t go too far,” Sokka mused. “There must be somewhere else he can go and be safe during the siege but still be close enough to lead his nation.”

“Somewhere we’re gonna find in the next,” Smellerbee checked the time counter that Sokka’s mechanist friend had given her, “ten minutes? Because that’s how long we’ve got until the eclipse. We’ve already dealt a huge blow to the Fire Nation today. Maybe the best thing we can do now is cut our losses and go.”

“No way,” Toph disagreed firmly. “Then not only was all this for nothing – because you know the Fire Nation is going to regroup too fast for it to matter – but we also miss the eclipse. When else will Aang have a chance to beat the Fire Lord?”

“There’s… another place,” Ty Lee spoke up, startling all of them, for she had arrived so silently that none of them had noticed. Haki hovered nearby, too. “I don’t know for sure if they’d be using it today….”

“If you know about it, they probably wouldn’t,” Suki dismissed, not unkindly.

“I’m not supposed to.”

Everyone looked at her strangely. “What do you mean?” Katara prompted.

Ty Lee shrugged self-consciously. “The palace has lots of high places for little kids to hide. I’ve always known lots of things I wasn’t supposed to.”

That explained so much about Zuko’s childhood and answered so many questions he had nearly forgotten by now. “Where is it?”

Ty Lee paled. “…Maybe you shouldn’t go, Zuko,” she suggested mildly, which was, in and of itself, an answer.

“That’s disgusting,” Jet spat, visibly repulsed. “Why - ?”

“It’s the most fortified place in the capital,” Ty Lee reasoned. “Hardest place to break in or out of.”

Zuko took a moment to breathe in and out, slowly and carefully. He was not going to lose his focus. Not now, when Aang was about to need him more than ever. “At least tell me the entrance isn’t inside my cell.”

“No. It’s in another cell in the same prison. The whole thing is metal, but that won’t be a problem for Toph.”

Zuko straightened his back. “If Toph is going, then I’m going. That was the deal, remember?”

“That was the deal,” Toph confirmed before anyone could object. “What if something happens out here and I’m not there to keep track of him, anyway?”

“I could – “

“You could what, Sokka? Feel his heartbeat from a mile away and move him to safety with earthbending?”

Sokka deflated.

“Having Zuko closer is better for our chi connection anyway,” Aang agreed resignedly.

“To get to the entrance, you make the first left, then – “

“Hang on,” Jet interrupted Ty Lee suspiciously. “Aren’t you going with them?”

Ty Lee hesitated. “I have an idea,” she admitted tentatively. “For an escape plan. Just in case.”

Sokka frowned. “We have the submarines still – “

“No, I know,” Ty Lee quickly assured him. “It’s just an idea for a quick escape if things go south.”

“Why don’t you guys talk about this later?” Toph snapped. “Ty Lee, where’s the entrance?’

Ty Lee quickly rattled off directions.

“I’m coming too.” Jet and Katara spoke at the same time and gave each other surprised looks.

“We’ve got enough people out here,” Suki agreed. “You guys go help Aang. Smellerbee, you go with Ty Lee and Haki. Longshot, you’re with Sokka and me. Jet, Katara, you two stick together.”

Zuko, Toph, Aang, Katara, and Jet mounted Appa. “Yip yip!” Zuko directed the flying bison to his old cell, putting all his effort into maintaining his composure. Thinking about his time imprisoned made him feel – angry, and – and a whole host of other things he didn’t want to think about. Suddenly Aang was beside him with a warm hand on the back of his neck. Zuko didn’t know if it was the connection of their chi, residual from their training that morning, or just Aang’s awareness of others, but he was grateful for it all the same. He mentally shook everything off. He had powered through all of those emotions before and he knew that he could do it again.

When they got to the prison, Aang led them through, navigating by Ty Lee’s instructions. Toph silently pressed her arm against his as they walked side-by-side. Whether this was support or a concerned warning, Zuko did not know, but he did suddenly take note of his increasing heart rate and took care to breathe deeply and slow it down.

They passed by his cell, and there were –

– chains, and –

– blood on the walls, and it had been three weeks, and had no one cleaned the cell at all in the three weeks since his rescue? Except he hadn’t been tortured at all in the days leading up to that rescue. In fact, he’d been there for just over a month, someone had told him, and at least half of that time had been after Azula left him alone, right? So the blood must have been there for at least two weeks before he was rescued. Could he possibly have been sitting in that cell alone with his own blood staining the walls and failed to notice? Or did Azula put those stains there after I left just to taunt me? Or did she know that I would stand here, staring them down, questioning my memories, questioning my sanity -

“Zuko,” Toph said slowly. “Zuko, are you with us?”

Zuko nearly panicked when he came to, wondering how long they had been trying to get his attention. He quickly relaxed; judging by their faces, he hadn’t been zoned out long enough to cause serious concern. “I’m fine,” he promised, because he was fine, and not dizzy at all. “Let’s keep going.”

Jet stared grimly at Zuko’s old cell, something dark and hateful festering in his eyes. “Jet,” Katara addressed him sharply. “Can you focus?”

“…Yeah,” Jet uttered, tearing his gaze away. “I can do that.”

They moved on without further difficulty and reached the entrance in no time. Toph pressed her hand to the stone wall, centralizing her attention on her earthbending. Soon she turned and pushed hard against a different section of wall. The stone shifted under her hands as the earth cleared itself from their path and compressed itself into the sides of the short tunnel that formed. She pressed onwards, moving easily through the darkness, and ripped open the metal door in front of them. Within seconds of traversing the bunker, they came across a cowardly but helpful noble who gave them further directions, and then they reached a large, ornate door that Toph easily disposed of.

Inside, a throne sat at the end of a long, open space, upon which Azula lounged. She waved disdainfully. “Hello, Avatar, Zuzu, friends,” she greeted. “I’ve been looking forward to this.”

Zuko was… more okay than he had expected to be, in actuality. There may be an emotional fallout from this encounter later, but in the moment, he was okay.

“Where is he?” Aang thundered, readying his weapon. “Where is Fire Lord Ozai?!”

Azula huffed, placing one hand delicately over her chest as she stood. “You mean I’m not good enough for you? You’re hurting my feelings.”

“Enough,” Jet snarled, drawing his hook swords. “Tell us where he is, now. The eclipse has started, and you have no bending.”

“And stick to the truth,” Toph advised confidently. “I’ll be able to tell if you’re lying.”

“Are you sure? I’m a pretty good liar.” Azula tilted her head at Toph. “I am a four-hundred foot tall purple platypus bear with pink horns and silver wings.”

“…Okay, you’re good, I admit it.” Toph bended the earth around Azula into a pyramid-shaped prison. “But you ought to consider telling the truth anyway!”

The earth shattered. Azula smirked. “When I left Ba Sing Se, I brought home souvenirs: Dai Li agents!”

Three Dai Li agents dropped from the ceiling. They summoned a wall out of the ground, but Aang lunged forward and burst through it so forcefully that it crumbled. The agents moved toward him, shielding Azula. Aang pushed himself over their heads with that same combination of airbending and earthbending that he’d used earlier, but on a larger scale, and Azula had to backflip out of the way.

The agents went for Aang again, but Toph, Katara, and Jet intercepted them. With his hooks, Jet caught both wrists of one and crossed them behind the agent’s back, but the agent used the angle to send one earth glove at Toph and another at Zuko. Toph knocked hers out of the air with a slanted and unnecessarily large earth cylinder, and Zuko darted around him, drew his dao blades, and sliced across the agent’s legs deep enough to immobilize him for the fight. Beside them, Toph and Katara had worked together distracting the other two long enough for ice to creep up their legs and freeze them in place, but they smashed the ice with earth gloves before it could reach their hands or arms.

“Enough.” Zuko felt Aang’s chi… intensify, for lack of a better word, as it latched onto Zuko’s chi. A familiar gleam lit up the room, emanating from Aang’s eyes and tattoos. Suddenly he remembered how he’d been forced to look away from Aang earlier that same day for fear that his smile would disrupt Aang’s focus. Ironically, the memory made him want to laugh, but he refrained. “Tell us where the Fire Lord is so we can end this war.”

The Dai Li agents cowered in fear at the sheer power Aang emitted. Azula was unfazed. “I’d rather not. Why don’t you let me kill you so that I can end this war?” she proposed humorously.

“There doesn’t have to be anymore bloodshed today. Just tell me where he is,” Aang implored.

“Tempting,” Azula mocked. “But I quite like the bloodshed. You might say it’s a pastime of mine.” She looked directly at Zuko. This lasted all of two milliseconds, for Jet and Katara planted themselves directly between Zuko and Azula. Somehow he still felt her gaze as if it were piercing their bodies. She was not dissuaded by the obstruction. “I shed quite a bit of Zuko’s blood, very recently. Do you remember that, Zuzu?”

He did.

“That wasn’t as much fun as burning, though.”

He was going to… focus. On his chi, and Aang’s chi. Aang’s chi was, miraculously, still stable. Zuko focused on that.

“Shut up,” Jet snarled.

“You were always so quiet, so I took it as a personal challenge to make you cry out in pain. Once, you screamed. I see you still have the scar on your arm.”

Breathe in. I’m not there. Breathe out. I’m not there.

Jet stormed up to her, shaking off Katara as she tried to hold him back and readying his weapons threateningly. “Tell us where your father is, or I’ll make you tell us.”

“Once, you just passed out. It was pitiful. That scar is gone, but once I’ve killed all your friends, I can give it back to you.”

Breathe in. I’m not there. Aang’s chi was less stable.

Toph pressed her arm against him. Jet spoke again, but it was just noise in someone else’s ears.

“By the way, Zuzu – “

Breathe out. I’m not here.

“ – the Earth King has invited you to – “

I’m not there -

The world exploded into earthbending, waterbending, airbending, and the clanging of swords. Someone said, “Don’t do this!” and someone else said, “We need her alive - “ and someone else said, “We don’t have time for this!” and then Zuko was just…

…elsewhere, suddenly.

“There you are.” Something thumped onto the ground on his left. “You were… lost inside your head for a few moments.”

Zuko looked blankly at his hands. He lifted one of them to eye-level and produced a small flame. The eclipse, evidently, had ended. His hands looked strange, though. They were oddly opaque. He knew, logically, that they were supposed to be opaque, but somehow that didn’t seem right. He turned to Jet, who was sitting on his left, and tried to remember what he was supposed to say. “I… feel dizzy,” he supplied instead when he failed. He looked around for something to remind him of what he’d meant to say, and then he spotted his hands and remembered. “All of my hands are pale,” he added, which was still not quite what he’d meant to say, but was a step in the right direction.

Jet set his right hand on Zuko’s shoulder, pressed his left hand against his own face, and leaned over, facing away from Zuko. His body started shaking. Zuko was vaguely concerned for a moment that Jet was crying, but then it became clear that he was laughing. He wasn’t sure if that was better or worse, but at least it made him less uncomfortable. One of them was probably having some kind of nervous breakdown. Maybe both of them.

Nearby, a bird chirped. The world slammed into Zuko from all sides, bright and green and blue, and not at all resembling an underground bunker. “How did I - ?” He flattened the palms of his hands against the ground in front of him, the worn faux-leather of Appa’s saddle, and laid eyes on the prison building beside them. “Why am I out here? Where are the others?”

Jet gradually sobered until he could sit upright and face Zuko, but once he had done that, he just shook his head wordlessly in lieu of speaking.

“Jet,” Zuko pressed. “Jet, are they still in there? How did I get out here, and why am I out here if they’re still in there?” Aang’s words from earlier ran through his head. “In case I don’t come back,” he’d said. Had any of them come back?

Aang, Toph, and Katara burst out of the prison, rendering his questions irrelevant. Aang vaulted himself directly onto Appa’s head, while Toph and Katara swiftly scaled Appa’s side and threw themselves into his saddle. “Yip yip!” Aang directed. Appa took off into the sky, and Zuko watched bemusedly and frustratedly as the prison faded into the distance.

“What just happened?” Zuko demanded. “Where are we even going now?”

“We lost,” Katara said quietly. “They knew we were coming. They were prepared.”

“I know that,” Zuko snapped. “What happened after that?”

Everyone on the saddle just looked… lost. In the wretched, desolate silence that ensued, Aang muttered shamefully, “I failed.”

“Don’t give yourself so much credit, Twinkle Toes,” Toph advised sourly. “They were ready for us today. We didn’t stand a chance, in the end.”

“What Toph means,” Katara interjected with a sharp look at Toph, “is that there was nothing any of us could have done about this. Each of us made the best decisions we could. It just wasn’t enough.”

As Toph scooted towards the front of the saddle and leaned comfortingly against Aang, Katara scooted into the back of the saddle to sit between Jet and Zuko and convey the end of their fight with Azula in a hushed voice. “When she was… taunting you, Zuko, she wasn’t just taunting you. She was trying to get at all of us, and she succeeded. We were all distracted. Then I’m assuming something went wrong with your chi connection with Aang – I don’t know if one of you broke it off or if you both just sort of spurred each other on, but either way, suddenly he just completely lost control of the Avatar State and you – “ She looked at him in a mixture of concern, regret, and something like fear. “I don’t know if there’s a word for it, but you seemed to… shut down. Like your mind was asleep and the rest of you wasn’t. Toph told Jet to get you out of there. Aang stopped interrogating Azula and attacked her outright. Toph and I were trying to get Ozai’s location out of her still but we were also trying to stop Aang from killing her.” Katara scowled at Appa’s saddle. “We shouldn’t have bothered. At least one good thing would have come out of today then.”

Zuko didn’t know how he felt about Azula’s potential death, in general, but he was mildly disturbed by Katara’s blatant approval of anyone’s death.

“Anyone would have lost concentration,” she reassured him, patting his knee. “It’s not your fault, or Aang’s fault, or anyone else’s fault…. Oh, no.” Zuko followed her gaze to the swarm of soldier-carrying balloons that was rising into the sky with five airborne warships at its helm. “We’d better hurry,” she commented tensely.

They came to a stop beside Sokka, Suki, Longshot, Hakoda, and Bato. As Katara relayed an abridged version of the events that had just transpired, Aang hopped off of Appa. “I’m gonna do what I can to slow down that fleet.” He opened his glider and took off.

“Appa, you and I can help too,” Katara declared fiercely. She got back into Appa’s saddle.

Zuko was right behind her. “So can I."

Longshot followed them onto Appa, already drawing his bow.

The three of them followed Aang into the air. Zuko shot fireball after fireball, setting all of the balloons in his vicinity aflame. Beside him, Katara withdrew her water from her pouch and sliced through the balloons on one side, while Longshot fired explosive arrows at the balloons on the other side. Nearby, Aang shot right through each balloon he encountered, glider-first, effectively neutralizing them. Their efforts were no match for the sheer hordes soaring past though, and soon the four of them were forced to retreat to where the invasion had been pinned down mid-retreat.

As they swept under Toph’s horizontal earth barricade to land beside their friends, the aerial battalion ceased their attack and glided right over the invasion. “Why aren’t they turning around to attack us?” Katara demanded.

“They’re heading for the beach….” Aang’s eyes flew wide open with horror. “They’re gonna destroy the submarines!”

“How are we all going to escape?” Sokka wondered, eyes trained on the sky.

“Some of us can still escape,” Jet confirmed grimly. “But some of us will have to stay behind as a distraction, too.” Jet drew his swords, resolve clear on his face. “I’ve been told I’m a pretty distracting guy.”

“No, no, no,” Aang protested. “We’re not leaving you. We’re not leaving anybody!”

“Aang, as long as you’re out there, we still have a chance,” Jet told him firmly. “All of us can win this war, but only if you survive this battle.” He looked around.

Suki nodded slowly. “He’s right. You have to leave – “

“Don’t you mean we have to leave?” Sokka bit out, looking alarmed.

“I can’t leave my Kyoshi Warriors here, Sokka,” Suki replied gently. “And I know better than to ask Jet to leave his Freedom Fighters. You need to lead Team Avatar now.”

Longshot made to draw his bow again, but Jet grasped his wrist and shook his head. Longshot gave him a long, hard look, then reluctantly released his bow and set his hands down.

Suddenly three rope ladders fell from the sky, dangling right in front of them just past their makeshift shield. Zuko peered out from underneath and saw three war balloons hovering above them with familiar passengers. “Did someone order a backup plan?” Smellerbee called down. Ty Lee and Haki leaned over the sides of their respective war balloons, too.

“Was that Smellerbee?” Toph questioned immediately. “Where did she come from? Didn’t she go off with Ty Lee and Haki to go do… whatever?”

“Their ‘whatever’ was hijacking three war balloons,” Sokka revealed.

“Are they big enough for everyone?” Toph asked.

“No, but they’re big enough for the youngest of our group,” Hakoda voiced. “Quickly, while the airships are distracted. The Kyoshi Warriors, the Freedom Fighters, and, as Suki put it, Team Avatar should be able to escape on the three war balloons and Appa. If you all get out of here fast enough, the rest of us can surrender rather than fight, and we should be accepted as war criminals.”

Jet narrowed his eyes. “You think they won’t kill everyone they can anyway?”

“On this large a scale? No. They’re more likely to use us for slave labor than kill us. If we keep our heads down, we’ll all live to see the end of this war.”

“Do you know how much weight these things can take?” Suki shouted up to their elevated friends.

“More than enough,” Ty Lee shouted back. “I’m more worried about space than weight!”

“Okay, Freedom Fighters on this balloon,” Suki directed, gesturing to Smellerbee’s balloon, “and Kyoshi Warriors on these two, since there’s more of you. Haru, Teo, you two can go with Aang and the others on Appa.”

Everyone hastily boarded their respective vessels. Zuko kept his eyes trained on the Fire Nation airships and war balloons, which were swiftly decimating the submarines. Soon Toph told him, “We’re ready to go,” and tugged him along with her onto Appa. He watched regretfully as Katara and Sokka said goodbye to their father and Bato. Then they, too, mounted Appa.

“Thank you all for being so brave and so strong,” Aang said tearfully to the invasion combatants who remained on the ground. “I’m gonna make this up to you.”

With that, the Freedom Fighters, the Kyoshi Warriors, and Team Avatar took off. “I know just the place for us to go where we’ll be safe for a while,” Aang announced, steering Appa further north. “The Western Air Temple!”

Chapter Text

Everybody knows that you’re in trouble
Everybody knows what you’ve been through
From the bloody cross on top of Calvary
To the beach of Malibu
Everybody knows it’s coming apart
Take one last look at this sacred heart
Before it blows

Everybody Knows by Sigrid

Act III: The Prince

Chapter 17: Before It Blows

Ty Lee looked up as Aang landed on the edge of her war balloon. “We’re almost there,” he announced.

“Great,” Ty Lee replied cheerfully.

“How are the lessons going?” he asked, referring to the chi-blocking lessons Ty Lee had occupied herself with giving the Kyoshi Warriors on her balloon.

“Pretty well! My chi-blocking is a lot like the way the Kyoshi Warriors already fight, so they’re all picking up the forms really fast.”

“That’s awesome,” Aang enthused. He peered over her shoulder. “I gotta go check on the other balloons and let them know how we’re doing, but….” He considered her for a moment. “You fight kinda like an airbender. Did you know that?”

“I… um….” Ty Lee faltered. She felt a bit weird about revealing the origins of her fighting style when it had come from studying the books that her nation had stolen from his nation upon massacring them. The trust she had spent weeks cultivating among Zuko’s friends was still shaky at best. That felt like a dangerous thing to bring up.

Aang hardly seemed to notice her hesitance. “Anyway, we should spar together when we get there. I bet I could pick up your chi-blocking pretty fast, too!”

“Well, you did learn three new bending styles within a year,” Ty Lee pointed out. “But I think Zuko would rather you finish learning firebending before you learn anything else.”

Aang winced. “Yeah, that’s probably true. Okay, I’m gonna go now. I’ll see you soon!”

They landed at the Western Air Temple soon. Ty Lee smiled as she ran her hands over the familiar constructs. Maybe it was just because it was the first Air Temple she’d ever traveled to, but the Western Air Temple had always been her favorite. Smellerbee, who had been flying with the Freedom Fighters, eagerly reunited with Zuko, Jet, and Longshot, who had been on Appa. Ty Lee found the Team Avatar dynamics a bit strange; they were split in half pretty evenly, with Zuko as the only real connection between them. Suki and Jet had some sort of friendship founded in their leadership of their respective halves, Smellerbee had become pretty friendly with Suki and Sokka while traveling with them, and Aang generally seemed to get at least a little attached to anyone who stood still long enough. Apart from that, they seemed like two solidly separate groups. Ty Lee had to wonder how Zuko had somehow managed to become so deeply entangled in both of them without them seeming to have much to do with each other.

She was also terribly curious about what Jet had done to Katara to make her so uncharacteristically spiteful towards him, but she knew she wouldn’t be curious for long. The Western Air Temple had lots of high places for hiding and eavesdropping, after all.

“Ty Lee!” Suki greeted her nonchalantly. “Good job getting those war balloons. We would have suffered a much larger loss without them.”

“No problem!” Ty Lee chirped, pleased to be recognized. Adjusting to the lack of trust between herself and her companions had been difficult. She understood that it would take a long time for them to forgive her, and truth be told, she had yet to forgive herself either. Trust and forgiveness, though, were two unrelated concepts in her mind. To Zuko’s friends, they seemed to be the same thing, which meant trust would be a long time coming just like forgiveness, but Suki took care to acknowledge her efforts to win both of those. Life at Ty Lee’s circus had been a period of constant, glorious validation, and she was self-aware enough to admit that it was one of the things she missed the most. She valued Suki’s acknowledgement all the more because of that.

Everyone settled in and picked their rooms out. Ty Lee kind of wanted to sleep outside like she had when she was traveling, but Team Avatar was sleeping outside, so she opted for a room instead. She made sure she chose one with a nice window to slip out through, though.

Once rooms were chosen, everyone set about exploring. Ty Lee empathized strongly with their excitement. For her part, however, she’d already done her exploring two years ago, so she set about reacquainting herself with the best spots to forage. Ideally, she’d like to do something special for Aang, but her knowledge of Air Nomad cuisine was, of all the areas of Air Nomad culture, most limited. Still, she did know that air bison liked apples, and Momo was literally named after peaches, so she couldn’t go wrong with those. She scaled the side of the temple and reached the ground on the surface –

“Hey!” Ty Lee looked back down to see Jet narrowing his eyes at her in… suspicion, probably. It was hard to tell given the distance between them. “Where are you going?”

“I’m gathering food!” Surely he can’t find fault in that.

His eyes narrowed further. “By yourself?”

If I wanted to leave, I would have just left without anyone ever knowing. “Only because everyone else is exploring! I don’t mind company at all.”

He watched her for a few more moments, clearly indecisive about whether he wanted to keep an eye on her or stay away from her.

That was when Smellerbee trotted over. “Calm down, Jet. I’m going with her.”

“You are?” both Jet and Ty Lee asked, one of them significantly more dubious.

“Sure.” Smellerbee shrugged. “There’ll be time to explore later. Ty Lee’s got the right idea about food though. We didn’t think to stock up before the invasion. Besides, this way you can rest easy knowing someone is keeping an eye on Ty Lee.” She pulled a couple of climbing hooks out of a bag at her side and made quick work of joining Ty Lee above the temple as Jet walked away.

The journey to and from the apple trees and moon peach trees, as well as the picking of both fruits, were silent tasks. On the way back, Ty Lee paused, set down her bag of fruit, and knelt beside a patch of white lotuses. “Smellerbee?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you mind if I ask you about Zuko?”

“…Depends on the question,” Smellerbee replied guardedly.

“So, Zuko likes tea, right?”

“Yeah, more or less.”

“So… the thing is… this flower makes really good tea.”

“O…kay?”

“And I thought, you know, Zuko might like to have some.”

“And your question is…?”

“Well, the thing is….” Ty Lee took a deep breath, “Zuko and I had a conversation about white lotus tea, while he was imprisoned…. And it was… one of the things I used. To get him to tell me where you all might be.”

“…Hm.” Smellerbee set her own bag down too, frowning pensively. Ty Lee had been wary of sharing her question with any of them for fear of resurrecting whatever suspicion she’d managed to kill off. However, Smellerbee was on better terms with her than pretty much everyone except Aang, and she was level-headed enough that she might see past the mention of Ty Lee’s unpleasant history and appreciate that Ty Lee was trying to do something nice for Zuko. “Back in Ba Sing Se, Zuko was weirdly interested in collecting rare teas, so this is right up his alley…. If I present it to him instead of you, it might not make him think of being captured at all.”

Ty Lee’s heart sank a little bit, because she had wanted to be the one to give the flowers to Zuko, but she smiled and nodded all the same. That’s a selfish reason to do something nice, anyway…, and Smellerbee’s right.

They picked their bags back up and returned to camp with the fruit and the flowers, passing a few groups of foraging allies on the way. When they arrived, everyone there had broken into small groups around various campfires that had been set up outside. Team Avatar sat with two people she didn’t know. Smellerbee walked directly over to them. Ty Lee debated whether she should join some of the Kyoshi Warriors she’d befriended on the ride over or go hang out in her room, but then she remembered that she was still carrying the fruit for Aang, so she decided to stop by their campfire before making a decision.

“Blueko, we got some flowers for tea,” Smellerbee announced. She pulled the flowers out of a pocket in her bag and held them just out of his reach. “You can only have them if you promise I won’t have to make any, though!”

“Smellerbee, your tea is awful,” Jet teased. “No one was gonna ask you to make any.”

Smellerbee huffed and handed the flowers over to Zuko. “Ty Lee said you can make really good tea out of these,” she supplied. “It was her idea.”

Ty Lee perked up, then immediately tried to hide that she had perked up. She didn’t want them to think she’d only done it for the credit.

“We also have some fruit!” Smellerbee took the bag from Ty Lee. “Apples for Appa and moon peaches for Momo.”

“What are we supposed to eat?” Sokka complained.

“Apples and moon peaches?” Smellerbee suggested sardonically. “Doesn’t it seem kind of sacrilegious to hunt for meat in an Air Temple? I mean, really, Sokka?”

“This is a lot of fruit!” Katara remarked. “How did you guys get so much so quickly?”

“I already knew where the trees were, since I’ve been here before,” Ty Lee explained.

She got several questioning looks, but no one voiced their questions, so she didn’t answer them. She made to leave the fruit there, but Sokka took her by the arm and tugged her into a seat that he had evidently saved for her. “Take a seat,” he beseeched her, conspicuously jovial. Ty Lee obliged, pretending it was out of some sort of camaraderie and not because they were keeping an eye on her.

“Why did you call him Blueko?” the boy in the wheelchair asked Smellerbee curiously.

“Oh! We didn’t tell you guys!” Suki exclaimed. “So you know that bounty hunter who kept saving us?”

The other guy’s jaw dropped. “No way. This is the Blue Spirit?” He gestured to Zuko.

“Yep!” Suki affirmed.

He turned to Zuko. “You once kidnapped an old man from my village and interrogated him about Suki’s and Aang’s location?”

Zuko blanched. “…Oh, that was your village?”

“Zuko!” Suki swatted him on the arm half-heartedly. “At least tell me you didn’t hurt him.”

“I never hurt a civilian,” Zuko snapped indignantly. “I am sorry, though, Haru.”

Haru waved off his apology. “It’s fine. That guy also turned me in to the Fire Nation when I was arrested for earthbending, so that was just karma.”

An hour or so later, after dinner, Ty Lee excused herself. She didn’t feel comfortable just hanging out with them quite yet, so she figured she may as well do some warm-ups to keep herself sharp. However, Sokka darted after her and pulled her aside. “Hey, Ty Lee, if someone was captured by the Fire Nation, where would they be taken?”

“There’s a few prisons in the Fire Nation, and some in the Earth Kingdom colonies. I guess it depends on where they’re captured, what their abilities are, and how important they are. Are you asking about someone in particular?”

Sokka fidgeted. “I just want to know where my dad might be.”

“He’s a nonbender,” Ty Lee mused, stroking her cheek thoughtfully, “but he was the highest-ranking member of the invasion who was left behind, so they probably sent him to the Boiling Rock.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s the highest security prison in the Fire Nation.”

Sokka furrowed his brow. “I thought Zuko was in the highest security prison. Isn’t that what you said during the invasion?”

Ty Lee listened for that characteristic note of accusation in his voice, but there was none. He actually sounded really nice. In fact, he had been really nice all through dinner, suspiciously so. She filed away that information for later. “That prison is only for royalty. It’s not on the list of prisons they teach you about in school.”

“They teach you about prisons in school?”

“At least in the Royal Fire Academy for Girls. Maybe not in other schools.”

Sokka wrinkled his nose. “…Huh. And where is this high-security prison, anyway?”

“It’s on an island in the middle of a boiling lake,” Ty Lee answered.

“Wow, that really is high-security. Where’s the lake?”

“It’s inside a volcano between here and the capital. We actually flew right over it.”

“You don’t say,” Sokka remarked. “Thanks, Ty Lee!” He made a show of yawning and stretching. “Just knowing makes me feel better…. I’m pretty tired, I’m gonna go hit the hay.”

“Um…, okay….” Ty Lee trailed off as Sokka walked away. That was a pretty strange interaction, even for Sokka. She had a bad feeling about it….

That was how Ty Lee found herself sneaking through their camp with a blanket and a small selection of snacks in the dead of night. She was just setting her blanket in Appa’s saddle when behind her, she heard, “Where are you going?”

She squeaked and dropped the food. “N-Nowhere!”

Jet glared at her. “Nowhere?”

“I’m not going anywhere!” Oh, no. This wasn’t good at all.

He stepped closer. “Then what is all this?” he challenged, gesturing to Appa’s saddle.

“Uh….”

“I knew we couldn’t trust you,” he bit out, shaking his head.

“No, Jet, this really isn’t what it looks like – “

“I’m not an idiot – “

Both of them fell silent as Jet rotated on the spot, keeping Ty Lee in his peripheral vision as he looked behind him. Sokka stepped gingerly out of the shadows, also carrying snacks.

“Sokka?” Jet sounded much more confused and much less threatening. “Where are you going?”

“I’m going… uh…”

Sokka paused. Jet waited. Ty Lee waited.

“…nowhere?”

Jet groaned exasperatedly. “Seriously, guys, what is going on?”

Ty Lee and Sokka looked at each other for a few moments. Then Ty Lee blurted out, “Sokka’s going to the Boiling Rock to rescue his father!”

“What?!”

“No, I’m not!” Sokka defended. “I’m just spending some quality time with my best bud, Appa!”

“Wait, you two were going to take Appa?” Jet demanded incredulously.

Ty Lee frowned. “How else – “

“War balloons. Right there!” Jet pointed angrily in the direction of the place they’d left the war balloons.

“…Oh,” Ty Lee and Sokka uttered in unison.

“Man, you two are so lucky that I’m coming.”

Sokka started. “Wait, what?”

“You think I’m letting you go into the Fire Nation alone with, y’know, the Fire Nation?” Jet indicated Ty Lee.

“So... you’re not gonna tell anyone, or stop me?” Sokka clarified, bewildered.

“Could I stop you?” Ty Lee pointed out.

“I’m gonna tell Smellerbee, just in case something goes wrong,” Jet corrected. “But she won’t tell anyone else unless we’re gone for too long, and she can cover for us.” He made to leave, but then he stopped and eyed them both skeptically over his shoulder. “…You two are coming with me. I don’t trust either of you not to leave while I’m gone.”

By nightfall the following day, they were nearly at the prison. Ty Lee and Sokka sat alone in a very uncomfortable silence as Jet took his turn sleeping just as Sokka and then Ty Lee had both done.

Eventually, Sokka spoke. “So, Ty Lee, I’ve been wondering – when were you at the Air Temple before?”

“I stopped there when I was twelve,” Ty Lee explained. “I read about all of the Air Temples in scrolls that I was able to get my hands on in the Fire Nation, and I wanted to see it for myself.”

“Scrolls?” Sokka sat up straight, interest piqued. “Like… Fire Nation scrolls about Air Temples, or…?”

“A few of them were actually ancient scrolls from the Air Nomads themselves.”

“Huh.” Sokka stroked his chin thoughtfully. “I bet Aang would love to get his hands on those.”

“Once we win the war, I can try and find them again for him,” Ty Lee offered. “I don’t know if my parents kept my things after I left, but if they did, they should still have all of my scrolls.”

Sokka hummed. “Right. I guess they probably took it pretty hard when you betrayed the Fire Nation.”

Ty Lee frowned. “I mean, maybe. But I meant when I left the first time.”

“You mean… when you left to help Azula chase us all over the Earth Kingdom?”

Ty Lee winced. “No, I’d already been in the Earth Kingdom for two years by then.”

“…What?”

“Yeah, I ran away when I was twelve.”

Sokka choked. “Why would you do that?! You were a noble, and one of the best friends of the Crown Princess. And you just… left?”

“You try growing up with six sisters that look just like you,” Ty Lee retorted. “Or brothers, I guess.”

“Six? Man, I thought I had it bad with Katara! Still, though, you had everything: money, power, security. You really gave it all up just because of your siblings?”

Ty Lee sighed wistfully. “I don’t know how much power you think a girl in the Fire Nation has. Especially one who…” She hesitated.

“One who what?” Sokka prompted.

“…You guys all seem okay with Aang’s crush on Zuko,” she said tentatively.

“What do you – oh. Oh!” Sokka’s eyes widened, and then he shrugged. “Well, yeah. I’ll admit that same-sex relationships are unusual in the Southern Water Tribe, and unfortunately looked down on in the Northern Water Tribe, but there’s not enough of us left in the south for anyone to care and we haven’t had contact with our sister tribe for decades, so it’s not like their opinion means a lot to us. I’ve never really seen a difference anyway. People should just let each other live their lives, you know?” He leaned over the side of the war balloon, gazing thoughtfully at the clouds. “Suki says that it’s very important on Kyoshi Island to honor and respect each person’s sexual orientation because Kyoshi herself was openly bisexual. I think opinions vary throughout the Earth Kingdom, but Toph definitely doesn’t care. Are same-sex relationships not okay in the Fire Nation?”

“They’re illegal,” Ty Lee revealed. “Sentences vary depending on the ‘severity of the crime’ but I think there have been a few cases where people were executed.”

“Geez. Just when I thought the Fire Nation couldn’t get any worse….” Sokka fell downcast for a few seconds, then perked up. “Hey, is that – “

“Yep, that’s the Boiling Rock!”

“Awesome, we’re here!” Sokka woke Jet up, and the three of them watched as they grew nearer.

Until they began plummeting.

“What did you do?” Jet demanded, glaring at Ty Lee again as he snatched up her spark stones and shot off sparks into the flaming coal that powered the balloon as quickly as he could.

“Me? I didn’t do anything!” Ty Lee shouted indignantly. “Why would I sabotage a balloon that I’m currently aboard? Do you think I have some kind of death wish?!”

“The air outside is just as hot as the air inside, so we can’t fly anymore!” Sokka explained urgently.

“Great,” Jet barked. “Keep to the center, hang on tight, and get ready for a crash-landing!”

The three of them huddled around the center of the balloon and clung to the ropes that held the balloon in place. The basket they stood in went sideways just before it slammed into the lake, splashing boiling water all around them. Finally, they skidded across the lake and washed up right on the shore of the prison.

They quietly but hastily clambered out of the basket and turned to view the devastation, unanimously dismayed.

“Anyone know how to fix this?” Ty Lee asked resignedly.

Sokka and Jet shook their heads.

“…We’ll figure something out,” Jet decided. “For now, let’s get rid of the evidence.” He pushed the remains of the wrecked war balloon into the lake, and they watched as it sank. “First thing’s first; we need uniforms.”

They crept past the overnight guards and carefully snuck into the prison. When they reached the dorms, they busted open a vent and Ty Lee crawled through to the dorms and unlocked it from inside. Then they stole some spare uniforms and took shifts sleeping with one person staying on watch. Jet pretended to be asleep when it was Ty Lee’s turn to watch. Ty Lee pretended to believe him.

When morning came, they made their way through the prison, looking for a more secluded area to plan out their search for Hakoda. However, they were intercepted by a gaggle of guards running in the opposite direction. “Guards!” one called to them. “There’s a scuffle in the yard. Come on!”

Exchanging grimaces, they ran after the group of guards. As they entered the courtyard, Ty Lee heard a man say, “I didn’t do anything! I’m going back to my cell.”

Another man replied, “Stop right there, Chit Sang.”

“I don’t believe it,” Jet muttered under his breath.

“What?” Sokka whispered to him, but Jet shook his head and made a shushing gesture, moving forward to join the throng of guards and prisoners encircling the spectacle. Ty Lee and Sokka followed and pushed through until all three of them stood at the front.

“I’ve had it with your unruly behavior!” a guard declared smugly.

“What did I do?” a prisoner demanded.

“He wants to know what he did,” the guard sneered. He turned to his right, where Ty Lee, Sokka, and Jet stood. “Isn’t that cute?”

Ty Lee froze, petrified at being called upon. Jet lifted his chin and spoke, his voice brazen and demeaning. “Absolutely, sir.”

The guard nodded to him and turned back to the prisoner. “You didn’t bow when I walked by, Chit Sang!”

“That’s not a rule,” the prisoner, Chit Sang, protested.

“Do it!”

Chit Sang straightened his back and looked the guard right in the eyes. “Make me.”

The guard shook his head and walked away, but as he appeared to be departing, he suddenly whirled around and lashed out at Chit Sang with a whip made of fire. Chit Sang caught the whip in both hands and lashed back at the guard, who disrupted the flames with a lazy kick and tsked. “Firebending is prohibited,” he mockingly informed Chit Sang. “You’re going in the cooler.” He took in the guards surrounding him and pointed to Jet. “You! Help me take him in.”

“Yes, sir,” Jet agreed easily, and went away with Chit Sang and the guard without so much as a glance at Ty Lee and Sokka.

“…Alrighty,” Sokka said uneasily. “I guess we’ll just… look for him later, then….” He looked around awkwardly. “Let’s go… investigate?”

“Sure,” Ty Lee said equally uneasily. “Where to?”

Sokka shrugged. “Cafeteria is as good a place as any, and I don’t know about you, but all this sneaking around and being terrified that someone might kill us at any moment has made me really hungry.”

Ty Lee laughed, startled. “Food sounds good. Two sparrowkeets, one stone, right?”

The two of them meandered into the cafeteria and took some food. “Meat,” Sokka sighed blissfully as he piled Komodo sausage onto his plate.

Ty Lee gave him a funny look, but then she spotted extra spicy fire noodles and understood. She eagerly took as many scoops as she could justify, then followed Sokka to a table with a couple of empty chairs.

“Hey, new guys!” one guard greeted them, his voice teasing but not unkind. “I know it’s the rule to have your helmets on at all times, but this is the lounge. Relax.”

“A-Are you sure?” Sokka stammered. “I mean, I wouldn’t want the warden to – “

The rest of what he said was lost to the buzzing in Ty Lee’s ears. The warden, she thought frantically. Oh crap, oh crap, that’s Mai’s uncle, he’s gonna know who I am!

“T- Lio?” Sokka jostled her arm lightly as he used her old alias, bringing her back to reality. “You wanna take your helmet off?” His helmet had already been removed.

“Uh, I, um,” Ty Lee stammered, drawing a blank in her panic. “I have… a birthmark. On my nose. It’s pretty embarrassing.”

Somehow, the other guards did not notice her panic. Instead of calling her out on the lie, they hummed sympathetically. “I hear you, kid,” the first guard commiserated.

“So you guys have worked here a while, right?” Sokka asked.

The guards supplied an array of affirmative hums and nods.

“I had a question about some of the prisoners we have here. I mean, this is the most secure prison in the Fire Nation, so I know we’ve got some dangerous people in here. I was wondering how many of them are war criminals.”

“I think most people here are war criminals,” a second guard opined. “I mean, it depends on your definition of war criminals, too. We’ve got people from all over the world in here listed as war criminals, including people from the Fire Nation.”

“You mean soldiers who defect?” Sokka guessed.

“Yeah, but there are a few civilians too.”

“How does a civilian end up here?” Sokka inquired, bewildered.

“When a group of rebels gives us enough trouble, they get rated higher in terms of danger level and then sometimes their leaders end up here, just to make absolutely certain that they don’t escape and lead another insurrection. After all, the Boiling Rock has a clean record for prisoner escapes. No one’s ever broken in or out of this place.”

Ty Lee sensed Sokka’s next question and quickly redirected the conversation before he could ask it. “So we’re probably gonna get some people from that attack during the eclipse, right?” She shivered exaggeratedly. “I heard from a friend who was there that day defending the capital that they got really far. Kinda scary, but it makes me glad we’ve got a place as secure as this.”

“You’re telling me,” the first guard agreed.

“I would assume so, but I don’t know for sure. The warden doesn’t tell us things like that ahead of time,” the second guard revealed.

Ty Lee and Sokka made minimal small talk for the rest of their meal and absconded as soon as possible. When they were out of earshot of any fellow guards, Ty Lee turned to him and said, “Go ahead. Ask.”

“You guys have rebellions here in the Fire Nation?” he hissed, shock clear in his voice.

“Of course we do. I know we didn’t linger in any of the villages we passed through, but didn’t everyone seem weirdly poor considering how wealthy the Fire Nation is?”

Visibly troubled, Sokka looked away. “That never occurred to me.”

“You were in Ba Sing Se,” Ty Lee noted. “You must have seen how poorly the residents in the lower ring were treated, right?”

“Uh….” Sokka scratched his head and sheepishly admitted, “I didn’t really see the lower ring at all while I was there. I guess it wasn’t great there?”

Ty Lee shook her head. “There were a couple of rebel fighters there, too. They were rebelling against the Earth Kingdom, not the Fire Nation.”

The two of them wandered back to the courtyard where they had been earlier, hoping Jet would think to do the same. Thankfully, he joined them soon. “You guys find anything out?” he muttered.

“No one from the invasion is here yet,” Ty Lee reported unhappily. “No one knows if they will be, either. Apparently only the warden and maybe the higher-ups know.”

“I told Smellerbee to give us ten days, so we can wait for nine days to see if anyone does show up. In the meantime, we should start working on – “

“Have you guys seen the Ember Island Players perform?” Ty Lee interrupted loudly as a female prisoner inched closer to them from behind Jet.

Sokka looked confused, but Jet quickly caught on. “Nope, never seen ‘em.”

“They’re pretty good. I really loved their rendition of Love Amongst the Dragons – “

“Excuse me, guards?” the prisoner greeted them in a low voice. “You three look awfully busy, but there’s a strange new prisoner following me and I was hoping one of you might be so kind as to escort me to my cell.”

“Of course, miss,” Jet agreed. “Right this way.”

Jet strode off without preamble with the prisoner in tow.

“I really wish he would stop doing that,” Ty Lee complained.

“Didn’t that seem a bit suspicious to you?” Sokka put forth.

Ty Lee frowned. “Oh, I guess you’re right. Should we follow them?”

Sokka nodded, and so Ty Lee and Sokka waited a reasonable amount of time before sneaking after Jet and the prisoner. When they arrived on the scene, the two of them were hugging, so presumably things were fine?

“Do I get to stop being confused some day?” Sokka asked the world at large. Ty Lee quite agreed.

“Guys, this is Anklebiter,” Jet announced, pulling away slightly and ruffling the girl’s hair. “She’s one of the original Freedom Fighters.”

Sokka’s eyes widened. “What? Really?”

“Way back at the beginning, it was just Anklebiter, Smellerbee, and me,” Jet confirmed.

“How is Smellerbee?” Anklebiter demanded excitedly. “Is she still with you?”

“Yep.” Jet rattled off the names of the Freedom Fighters with them. “There’s more, I’m sure, who got away safely, but who I wasn’t able to find.”

“Don’t forget Zuko!” Sokka added enthusiastically.

“I was… leading up to that,” Jet admitted, watching Anklebiter’s face carefully.

“Zuko is a pretty uncommon name,” Anklebiter remarked, her tone and expression giving nothing away. “Can I assume it’s the same Zuko I’m thinking of right now?”

“I know this is gonna sound crazy, but he’s actually a really great guy,” Jet promised hopefully. It was jarring to see Jet seeking anyone’s approval other than maybe Katara to a lesser extent. “He’s not like the other scum in this nation. He’s different.”

Anklebiter deflated. “There’s, um, there’s something I have to tell you about ‘the other scum in this nation,’ Jet.”

Before she could convey that something, Ty Lee spotted a small group of guards meandering towards them. “Incoming,” she warned.

“We’re gonna get you out of here, Anklebiter,” Jet reassured her. “I promise.”

“I’ll find you three later,” Anklebiter replied. She quickly made herself scarce, and Ty Lee, Jet, and Sokka did as well in the opposite direction.

“As I was saying,” Jet muttered as they walked, “we need to start working on a plan. A couple plans, actually: one for if we find Hakoda within the next few days and escape with him, and one for if we’re still here waiting when the gang shows up on Appa. The second one is gonna have to be one we could enact at any moment because we don’t know when they’ll get here, if we’re here for that long.”

“Couldn’t we just wait for them to get here no matter what?” Ty Lee suggested. “That sounds easier than trying to find a way out of here on our own.”

“Too risky. Any plan that relies so much on improvisation and unfixed transportation is unstable at best. Besides, I don’t plan on sticking around here any longer than I have to. Every second that we’re here is a gamble.”

“Let’s work on the early plan first, since we’ve got time for the late one,” Sokka decided. “What we need, first and foremost, is a way off of this island and to the outside of the volcano. Something that floats and won’t burn, or something airborne.”

“If we can get something that floats, we can use that to get from the outside of the volcano back to the Air Temple,” Ty Lee pointed out.

“In that case, we need a sail,” Jet added.

“You’re getting ahead of yourselves,” Sokka scolded. “We still need something that floats and won’t burn. So… something metal, obviously….”

Jet shook his head. “Anything metal would burn us.”

“What about the coolers?” Sokka questioned. “If the point of them is to keep firebenders in, then they must be completely insulated and sealed to keep the cold in, and if they keep the cold in, they must also keep the heat out, right?”

“That’s a good idea, Sokka,” Jet remarked.

“How do we get in, though?” Sokka pondered. “Because we need someone to get inside of one and unbolt it, but they only put firebenders in there.”

Jet straightened his back. “I know who can do it.”

“Absolutely not.”

“What?!” Jet demanded, aghast.

Chit Sang snorted. “Look, I’m grateful to you and your friends from saving me from this place before, even if I ended up here in the end anyway, and I’ll gladly help out with any other plan you think up as long as it gets me out of here too, but there’s no way I’m going into one of those coolers on purpose.”

“Great,” Jet growled. “Any idea where we’ll find a firebender who will?”

Chit Sang shrugged.

Jet sighed. “We’ll just have to ask Anklebiter if she knows anyone, then.”

Unfortunately, they didn’t know where Anklebiter’s cell was, and nobody knew who Anklebiter was, so presumably she went by her real name which Jet did not know. By lunchtime the following day, they were still looking for her, limited by their need for discretion and subtlety. That was when they saw the guard who had taunted Chit Sang tormenting someone else.

“What’s wrong with you today, freak?” he sneered

The boy in question kept his head down, clinging tightly to his tray of food. He was at least two feet shorter than the guard and looked far too young to be in prison, especially a prison like the Boiling Rock.

“I asked you a question.”

“Lay off of him,” a girl nearby snapped. “We’re just getting our food.”

“Don’t talk to me like that, girl,” the guard barked, shooting her a nasty look.

The third person with them, who looked to be much older (though still quite young), held their tray in one hand and raised their other hand placatingly. “Please, sir, we don’t want any trouble – “

“I didn’t ask you!” the guard snarled. “You two better stay out of this if you know what’s good for you, and you - “ he took the boy’s wrist in a punishing grip, causing him to wince – “you better look at me when I’m talking to you, dammit!”

“Don’t you dare hurt him,” the girl warned the guard, handing her tray to her friend.

The guard glared at her and visibly tightened his grip. “Weren’t you a soldier?” he scoffed at her. “How can you stand there and defend this trash?” He lifted his head and his voice to reach everyone in the prisoners’ cafeteria. “Who thinks I should teach this bitch a lesson?” he hollered, summoning a flame in the palm of his free hand and holding it dangerously close to the girl, who glared back at him, undaunted.

The guards in the cafeteria cheered. Ty Lee felt sick, and judging by what she could see of their faces, Sokka and Jet felt pretty sick too.

“We have to help them,” Sokka whispered urgently, stepping forward.

“No,” Jet hissed, grabbing his Sokka’s shoulder and holding him back. “Sokka, you’ll blow our cover.”

“But – “ Sokka looked desperately between Jet and Ty Lee, then deflated. “You’re right. I just hate not being able to do anything.”

The guard threw fire at the girl. She closed her eyes and turned her face, but otherwise didn’t flinch.

Out of nowhere, Anklebiter threw herself between them and extinguished the fire.

“There you are, a real knight in shining armor,” the guard jeered. “Someone take this girl to the cooler!”

“Yes, sir!” Ty Lee shouted, practically running forward before any other guard could volunteer. She hadn’t expected this turn of events, but she was perfectly willing to take advantage of it all the same. She took Anklebiter by the arm as gently as she could with everyone watching and pulled her out of the courtyard. “I’m a friend of Jet’s,” she hissed, slowing her pace once they were out of sight as a way of stalling. “I didn’t know you could firebend.”

Anklebiter wilted. “Yeah…. Neither did he.”

“We need a firebender for our plan anyway,” Ty Lee continued. “There’s no time to explain, but you have to unbolt the cooler once you’re inside, okay?”

“Okay,” Anklebiter agreed, taking it in stride more than Ty Lee had expected her too. Then again, if she had history with Jet, she was probably used to strange and unexplained requests like that.

Ty Lee led Anklebiter to the cooler and, with a whispered apology, pushed her inside and closed the door.

An hour later, Ty Lee, Anklebiter, and a handful of bolts were greeted by Sokka, who brought them to a dark corner of the prison where Jet waited with Anklebiter’s three friends.

Before anyone else had a chance to speak, Jet faced Anklebiter. “You’re a firebender?”

Anklebiter shrunk away from his glare. “Yes.”

“How could you keep that from me?” he demanded. “You were my best friend!”

“You hated the Fire Nation so much. I – I didn’t know how you would react – “

“Don’t you trust me?”

“Of course I do!”

“Then why didn’t you tell me?!”

“I was ashamed, okay?” Anklebiter blurted out. “I hated myself for having the same blood as the people we were fighting and I couldn’t imagine anyone not hating me for it.”

Jet’s gaze softened a little. “Anklebiter, having the same blood doesn’t make you the same as these bastards – “

He gestured off-handedly to the other three prisoners with them. The girl barked, “Excuse me?!”

“You can’t talk about them like that!” Anklebiter added.

“What?!” Jet exclaimed incredulously.

“They’re my friends – “

“They’re Fire Nation!”

“I’m Fire Nation!” Anklebiter reminded him, looking hurt.

Jet shook his head fiercely. “You might be a firebender, and you might have Fire Nation blood, but you’re not Fire Nation.”

Anklebiter straightened her back and lifted her chin, looking more like Jet and Smellerbee than she had at any point beforehand. “I’m no less Fire Nation than they are.”

“That one,” Jet pointed at the girl, “was literally a soldier in their army!”

“I didn’t have a choice!” the girl protested.

“There’s always a choice,” Jet scoffed at her.

“Tell that to my sick father, you asshole!” the girl spat back.

Anklebiter cut off the quickly escalating argument. “Look, Jet, I got the damn bolts out of the cooler for you. Now you and your friends can leave.”

Everyone froze. Jet stared at her in shock. “What about you?”

“I’m not leaving my friends,” Anklebiter declared.

Jet scowled. “So that’s how it is?”

“Yeah, Jet. That’s how it is.”

“Fine, then!”

“Fine!”

Jet and Anklebiter stormed off in opposite directions.

The five remaining individuals sat quietly in the awkward silence that ensued until finally Sokka dared to break the silence. “Jet doesn’t, um, speak for all of us.” He winced sheepishly. “About the whole Fire Nation thing.”

The girl hummed skeptically.

“Really! My best friend is actually the prince of the Fire Nation himself!”

That caught their interest. “The banished Prince Zuko?” asked the youngest of them, the boy.

“Yeah!” Sokka beamed, then looked horrified and clapped a hand over his mouth, then lowered it just enough to utter, “Oh, no. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“Isn’t he teaching the Avatar himself to firebend?” the boy enthused. “I heard that he killed Admiral Zhao in the Siege of the North!”

“I mean, that was actually Aang, so….” Sokka frowned at him. “How do you guys know all that?”

“Not all of the guards are like Rema,” the oldest prisoner explained, referencing the guard who had provoked Anklebiter and assaulted Chit Sang. “A lot of them are as bored as we are from being stationed here for so long, so gossip travels quickly here. Is it true that he helped lead the assault against the capital?”

“I’ll tell you one thing I know that isn’t gossip at all,” the girl voiced solemnly. “I wouldn’t be alive if it weren’t for him.”

Ty Lee’s interested was piqued. “Really?”

“I was in the 41st division three and a half years ago.” The other two went silent as the girl looked down. “I lied about my age to get into the army so I could earn money for my family. I had just gotten through boot camp and my division was to be sent to a village just outside of the Northern Air Temple, guarded by some of the Earth Kingdom’s strongest earthbenders. We all knew we were being sent to our deaths. We received word partway through the battle itself that the order to march on that village had been rescinded. It was too late to retreat for most of my unit, but not for me. A year or so later, I had General Teroh, the highest-ranking officer in charge of my unit right below the Fire Lord himself, at my mercy. I was going to kill him. He swore to me that he wasn’t responsible. He showed me the transcripts from the war council where our fates were decided. As it turns out, that was the war council where young Prince Zuko spoke up to defend us, and was sentenced to an Agni Kai with his own father for it. General Teroh said he was inspired by the prince’s boldness and traded a nearby unit of his own with more veteran soldiers for what was left of my unit.”

“That’s how he got the scar,” Sokka commented softly with a bittersweet smile. “I never knew. I mean, I knew it was from the Agni Kai with his father, but I didn’t know how he ended up in the Agni Kai. That sounds just like him.”

“I knew,” Ty Lee said, “but only because Azula told me afterwards.”

The three prisoners stiffened. “You… You knew the Crown Princess?” the eldest hissed as they subtly withdrew from her.

Ty Lee blanched.

“Before, yeah,” Sokka quickly stepped in. “But she also risked her life getting Zuko out of prison – “

“I’m also the reason he was there,” Ty Lee admitted guiltily.

“Well – okay, that’s true, but only partially, and then you changed your mind and helped us save him instead, and he might have been there without your intervention anyway,” Sokka encouraged her. “Besides, we only got so much of the invasion force to safety thanks to you stealing those war balloons. No one else thought of that, and you took a big risk sneaking right past the army like that. And now you’re here to help me save my dad.”

“Who’s your dad?” the eldest asked. “We might know him.”

“His name’s Hakoda,” Sokka announced proudly. “He’s the Chief of the Southern Water Tribe, and he led the invasion along with Jet and my girlfriend Suki. We already asked around, though, and he’s not here. We’re hoping he’ll be sent here before we leave.”

“When are you leaving?” the girl asked.

“We need to be back at camp within the next five nights, so… soon, I guess?”

The youngest prisoner frowned. “If you guys got here by war balloon in one day, and now you’re leaving by cooler, which obviously isn’t built for traveling by water or at all, it’s probably going to take you… about four days?”

“…Oh.” Sokka smacked himself in the forehead. “Geez, we’re all such idiots. How were we so stupid?” He deflated. “So we don’t have time to wait for my dad, after all. We’re gonna have to leave without him.”

“I’m so sorry, Sokka,” Ty Lee consoled.

Sokka looked down. “It’s… It’s fine. Let’s just make sure we get out of here.”

“We’ll have a sail ready for you by tomorrow night,” the eldest offered, exchanging glances with the boy.

Sokka looked right back up. “You’d do that for us? Why?”

“You guys are with the Avatar, right?” The boy shrugged.

“Contrary to what your friend Jet thinks,” the girl said, “we don’t like Fire Lord Ozai any more than you three do. If we can help take him off the throne, then that’s what we’ll do. That’s what our goal has been for years. If we can help put Prince Zuko himself on the throne, well, that’s even better.”

“Thank you.” Ty Lee grimaced. “I don’t even know your names!”

“I’m Chio,” the girl introduced. “This is Dezi,” she gestured to the boy, “and Sao.” She gestured to the other prisoner.

The following night saw Jet, Ty Lee, and Sokka rolling a cooler down to the shore, where Anklebiter, Sao, and Dezi waited.

Sao stepped forward with an obviously handmade sail. “I saved the bolts from the cooler,” they informed everyone, “and I brought tools to bolt this into the cooler so you can use it to, y’know, sail. It’s not much, but – “

“This is plenty!” Ty Lee reassured them. “Thank you so much, Sao.”

“Not to look a gift ostrich horse in the mouth or anything,” Sokka interjected, “but I am dying to know how you got your hands on supplies to make this with.”

Sao gestured to Dezi, who grinned, a hint of cockiness shining through for the first time since they'd met him. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but this place isn’t made for people as small as me. I can get into lots of places I’m not supposed to…. Well, not ‘lots,’ but enough places.”

Ty Lee, Sokka, and Dezi watched as Sao set about installing the sail in the cooler. Nearby, Jet shuffled uncomfortably towards Anklebiter. “…You’re sure you won’t come with us?”

“I’m sorry, Jet, but I stand by what I said. I can’t leave my friends here any more than you could leave any of your Freedom Fighters in a place like this.”

“I still don’t understand how you can consider yourself so close to Fire Nation people,” Jet confessed. “But I guess I would have felt like that about Zuko, too, if I’d known who he was before I called him a Freedom Fighter. I stand by what I said, too, Anklebiter: I’m gonna get you out of here. Maybe not tonight, but as soon as I can, I swear. And if you’re really not going anywhere without these three, then I may not like them, but I’ll get all four of you out of here anyway.”

Ty Lee chanced a glance at them, curious. Anklebiter looked a bit miffed still, but eventually sighed fondly. “Baby steps, I suppose.” She hugged Jet. “Be careful out there, make sure you and Smellerbee take care of our kids for me, and thank Mister Fire Nation Prince for breaking the ice for me about firebending.”

Jet laughed. “Sure, Ankle.”

“Stop!”

Alarmed, everyone stopped what they were doing to look in the direction the panicked hiss had come from. Chio was racing along the shore so quickly that her feet were half-sliding with each step and kicking up sand behind her. “What’s wrong?” Dezi asked.

“New prisoners,” she panted, “coming tomorrow morning. War prisoners.”

Sokka’s eyes lit up. “War – ? That could be my dad!”

Jet worried his bottom lip. “If we don’t leave tonight, we won’t make it back in time to stop Smellerbee and the others from trying to rescue us,” he cautioned.

“We can’t leave if Chief Hakoda is on his way,” Ty Lee argued as Sokka’s face fell.

“I’m not saying we should,” Jet snapped. “I’m just stating the facts.”

“Well, your facts are wrong.” Ty Lee straightened her back. “I have a backup plan.”

“What’s your plan?” Sokka squinted dubiously at her.

“It’s simple. We need someone to come to the Boiling Rock with their own mode of transportation. When they get here, then we can hijack the gondola, and then we can hijack that transportation and use it to get home faster.”

“Simple, huh?” Jet narrowed his eyes. “And how do we get someone here?”

“If I get captured,” Ty Lee declared, “Azula will be here within a day, max.”

“Absolutely not,” Sokka shot down as Jet looked at her with contemplation and newfound respect in his eyes. Sokka turned hopefully to Jet, possibly looking for backup, and glared deeply at him as soon as he saw Jet’s face. “Jet, don’t tell me you’re considering it.”

Jet threw his hands in the air. “Look, Sokka, do you want to rescue your father or not?”

“I – I – “ Sokka looked desperately between Jet and Ty Lee. “I mean, I do, but this is crazy! We’re not only actively inviting Azula to attack us, which is batshit fucking insane by itself, but we’re also offering up Ty Lee on a silver platter? No way.” He shook his head and crossed his arms. “That’s not how Team Avatar does things.”

“Azula won’t even know that you two are here when she first gets here,” Ty Lee pointed out. “And I’ll be distracting her the whole time while you guys stage our escape.”

“So how are you getting out?” Sokka challenged. “What is it with you Fire Nation people and constantly trying to martyr yourselves?!”

“I feel like I should be offended,” Sao muttered, “but he’s not wrong.”

“Hold on – I’m not suggesting we leave Ty Lee here,” Jet quickly corrected.

“Neither am I!” Ty Lee assured him. “I said our escape, didn’t I? Once she realizes what you guys are doing, that’s when I can sneak out.” When Sokka still looked uncertain, she added, “I spent my whole childhood sneaking around the Fire Nation Royal Palace, Sokka. Right under the noses of two different Fire Lords. I can do this.”

“…Fine,” Sokka reluctantly allowed.

Jet turned to Anklebiter. “You guys should get out of here,” he told her. “The cooler is already here, the sail is mostly already in place – there’s a perfectly good escape right here. Someone might as well take advantage of it.”

“I don’t feel right leaving you guys here,” Anklebiter confessed. She turned to Chio, Sao, and Dezi. “You three could – “

“Not a chance,” Chio cut her off.

“I don’t understand,” Sokka said bemusedly. “Why would you stay here when you could, you know…, leave?”

“You’re with the Avatar,” Chio replied simply. “If we get out of here, that’s four lives that are changed for the better. If you guys get out of here, that’s the whole world changed for the better. What are we, compared to that?”

While Sokka and Jet went to see if Hakoda was one of the arrivals the next day, Ty Lee discreetly packed some food for their return journey, taking advantage of her acrobatically enhanced hiding prowess whenever someone came by. Later, when she was waiting with the four prisoners, the glow on Sokka’s face as he and Jet joined them told her everything she needed to know. Finally, it was time to stage Ty Lee’s capture.

It was, in comparison to their typical plans, exceedingly simple. Ty Lee took her helmet off for dinner that night. Jet conveniently recognized her from one of the wanted posters hanging in the lobby (luckily, only posters of her, Zuko, and Aang were up, at least in regards to Team Avatar). Ty Lee didn’t bother holding back when she tried to fight her way out, but the fight was rendered predictably fruitless by the sheer overwhelming multitude of guards that swarmed her. She was in a cell within half an hour, and everything was going according to plan.

The morning afterwards brought trouble, because that, Ty Lee was swiftly learning, was just what happened with Team Avatar’s plans.

“You idiot,” Mai growled as she stormed into Ty Lee’s cell and slammed the door shut.

“Mai?” Ty Lee sat up, excited to see her friend despite herself. “What are you doing here?”

“What am I doing here? What are you doing here, Ty Lee?”

Ty Lee wilted. She had been prepared to bluff her way out of this line of questioning with Azula, but it was unexpectedly harder now that Mai was questioning her instead. “I… I….”

“How could you be so reckless?” Mai snapped. “Don’t you know what Princess Azula is going to do to you when she gets here?”

“I’ll be fine,” Ty Lee rebuffed half-heartedly.

Mai snorted. “Oh, sure. You’ll be fine. You only ripped out the heart of the angriest, most dangerous, most powerful girl in the Fire Nation. You’ll be fine. Agni, Ty Lee, just once, I would love it if you could think things through!”

“I did think things through!” Ty Lee objected.

“Then why are you here?!” Mai exploded before quickly reining in her temper. “Why did you come back?”

“Come… back…?”

“Why would you come home just to leave again? Don’t you know how much worse that was?” Mai crossed her arms and turned away. “You should have stayed gone, Ty.”

“That’s not fair!” Ty Lee protested. “Azula didn’t give me a choice!”

“I don’t know why I’m surprised,” Mai continued snidely. “That’s what you do, isn’t it? You run away every time something makes you uncomfortable.”

“Wha – But – “ Ty Lee stared at Mai in silence, her dumbfoundment rendering her speechless. Finally she found her voice again, spurred on by sheer outrage. “You told me to leave!” she shouted. “You’re the one who came up with the idea of running away from home two years ago! You suggested it to me – and you know what, I still talked to you before I left and you said you were okay with it!”

“Well, I lied!” Mai shouted. “Obviously, idiot!”

“That’s not my fault!” Ty Lee snapped.

“I never said it was! But the second time – “ Mai’s voice cracked, and her eyes widened, mirroring Ty Lee’s shock at the rare show of emotion.

“…Mai?” Ty Lee whispered when her friend had been quiet for too long.

“You didn’t even say goodbye, Ty Lee,” Mai uttered, resentment etched into every facet of her countenance. “One day you were home, the next you were gone again. I didn’t even know if you were alive.”

Ty Lee’s gaze softened now that the core of Mai’s anger had been revealed. “I’m sorry, Mai,” she said gently. “I didn’t want to make you choose between Azula and me. I just… I just wanted you to be happy.”

“And I wanted you to be safe.” Mai laughed hollowly. “That worked out well for me, right?”

“I wanted Zuko to be safe.”

“Not until we got home from Ba Sing Se,” Mai retorted.

“What do you want me to say, Mai?” Ty Lee bit out tiredly. “I’m not sorry that I saved him. I’m not sorry that I left. What should I have done differently?”

Unbidden, a memory floated to the surface of Ty Lee’s mind.

“I don’t answer stupid questions.”

“Come on….” Ty Lee tilted her head, widening her eyes earnestly at Azula. “Can’t you, just once? For me?”

Azula stared her down for a few moments, then sighed heavily, as if some weighty task were being placed on her shoulders. “Fine. Yes, Ty Lee, I will miss you.”

“Aw, ‘Zula!” Ty Lee threw her arms around her best friend, and noted that said friend must be way more upset than she was letting on if she were actually allowing that. “I’m gonna miss you and Mai so, so, so much. I’m gonna write you letters every day!”

“There’s no way I’ll have time to read that,” Azula deadpanned.

Ty Lee huffed. “Fine. Every week, and you better write back, too!”

She placed the last of her things in the canoe. At the same time, Azula announced brusquely, “Well, that looks like everything.”

Ty Lee turned back to Azula, and for a moment, she saw not just Azula, but who Azula could be: not just strong and brilliant and crazy powerful, but good, too. The thought threatened to glue her feet to the ground. Come with me, she thought, but didn’t say, didn’t plead, cry, or beg like she wanted to, because Azula had everything she wanted in the Fire Nation and when Ty Lee left, she too would have everything she wanted – except Azula. In the end, all she said was, “Goodbye, Azula.”

All of Ty Lee’s guilt crashed down on her like a tsunami of bad decisions. If she had just asked that one simple question, everything might be different. Everything might be the same, too. Ty Lee would never know, and maybe she was grateful for that, because she wouldn’t have liked either answer.

She couldn’t keep Azula. She knew that, now. But maybe she could keep Mai.

“Come with me,” Ty Lee pleaded.

Mai stiffened. “What?”

“Come with me!” Ty Lee leaned forward, trying desperately to catch Mai’s eye. “Please, Mai!”

“You’re asking me to betray my country and my family,” Mai said, which wasn’t a ‘no.’

“Your family? Yeah, maybe. But you’ve always said you hated them anyway, and I’m your family too, Mai, and you’re mine – and as for your country, I’m asking you to help them, not betray them. Zuko’s going to be Fire Lord, and he’s going to make things better for everyone, not just the nobles, and we can be part of that!” Ty Lee leaned as far forward as she could. “I don’t want to leave you again, Mai. But I can’t stay. I could never have stayed. You saw that before I did, two years ago….” Ty Lee trailed off into shocked silence as Mai suddenly knelt in front of her and unlocked her handcuffs on either side.

“We don’t have a lot of time,” Mai informed her pragmatically. “Azula’s going to be here soon. I know you got captured on purpose to distract her, but she’s not even planning to leave her airship. You’re going to be transported to the Capital City Prison before you even see her.”

Ty Lee’s lungs constricted as she tried to get her feet under her, suddenly dizzy. “What?” Prisoners might get tormented at the Boiling Rock, but they didn’t get tortured. In the Capital City Prison….

Mai handed her a knife.

“What am I supposed to do with this?” Ty Lee asked, bewildered.

“You’re going to take me hostage and steal my airship before Azula gets here.”

“Mai, you’re a genius!” Ty Lee gasped. “Wait, does this mean you’re coming with me?”

“No,” Mai denied, sounding almost regretful. “You’ll have to let me go once you get to the airship. I can’t leave Tom-Tom, but I’m not gonna let you be the next person Azula tortures.”

Ty Lee deflated, but nodded in understanding. “Okay. Just… stay safe until Zuko’s on the throne. Please.”

“Sure, Ty. I told my guards to wait with my uncle and give us some privacy,” Mai informed her, “so we should have a clear path to sneak to wherever your friends are. We’ll have to hurry, though – not just so Azula doesn’t get here, but so no one comes to check on us and realizes we’re missing.”

Ty Lee and Mai quickly but discreetly made their way to the courtyard where Sokka, Jet, and the others were debating whether or not to execute their plan with Mai’s airship rather than waiting for Azula to show up. “Good timing!” Jet greeted her, surprised. “I guess that means – “ He broke off, catching sight of Mai.

“Are we just recruiting the whole Fire Nation to our side now?” Sokka wondered. “Is that a thing that we do? Because I am totally on-board with that.”

“I’m not on your side,” Mai interjected. “I’m on Ty Lee’s side.”

“Ty Lee’s on our side, so I’m not sure what kind of difference that’s supposed to make, but….” Sokka gave her two thumbs-up. “Congratulations?”

“Have you told her what the plan is yet?” Dezi asked bluntly. “Because I don’t think she’d like it.”

“Actually, Mai’s our hostage now!” Ty Lee chirped.

Everyone stared at her.

“I volunteered,” Mai deadpanned. “Can we go yet? I’m bored.”

“…We’re gonna need a distraction,” Jet said, adapting admirably well. “Something to get more of the guards out of the way so that we have a clean shot to our getaway.”

“Leave it to me,” Chio declared. “You wanna know a little something about the Fire Nation scum in this prison, Jet? Watch this.” Without giving him a chance to answer, Chio climbed onto a table, stood at full height, cupped her mouth, and hollered, “Hey! Who wants to help friends of the Avatar and Prince Zuko escape this hellhole and save the world?!”

A raucous cheer rose up from… actually, pretty much the whole courtyard.

“That’s what I thought,” Chio declared, satisfied.

“What,” Jet said, flabbergasted.

Prisoners swarmed them, pointing and shouting excitedly. “Okay, here’s the plan,” Chio dictated authoritatively. “I need a thick layer of prisoners protecting Chief Hakoda of the Southern Water Tribe, his son Sokka, the Freedom Fighter leader Jet, Ty Lee, and their hostage, Mai. The rest of you are going to riot!” The cheering intensified. Chio directed dozens of prisoners to envelop Ty Lee and the others. Everyone leftover immediately began

“Okay, team!” Sokka clapped his hands together. “Let’s move!”

“Are you guys forgetting something?” Mai held her hands out pointedly.

“…Oh!” Ty Lee used the handcuffs she’d brought from her cell to shackle Mai and make their façade more believable. Then Ty Lee stood behind her, wrapped an arm around her chest, and put a knife to her throat.

Together, Ty Lee, Mai, Sokka, Jet, and Hakoda marched through the prison, surrounded by inmates. An incredibly tall, incredibly muscular woman plucked Sokka from the ground and placed him on her shoulders so that he could see to direct them. (In other news, if Ty Lee hadn't been gay before, she certainly was after that display.) They reached the gondola with remarkable ease and piled inside well ahead of schedule based on when Mai had predicted Azula’s arrival.

“Bye guys!” Ty Lee called out of the window, waving enthusiastically at the inmates who were surrendering to the guards and getting herded to their cells. “Thanks for the help!”

“That was not how I expected to get out,” Hakoda mused. “Not that I’m complaining.”

Sokka sighed heavily. “I’m just glad to be out of that place.”

“…Uh,” Ty Lee said at length.

“What is it now?” Sokka groaned.

“They’re… They’re cutting the rope,” Jet realized.

Ty Lee watched as two guards began sawing the rope under the warden’s direction. Beside her, Mai was suddenly very still.

“We can still get out of this,” Sokka decided, his sudden determination failing to disguise his panic. “Everyone here can climb, right? Does anyone know what the height of this rope is? We can use the handcuffs to – “

“Sokka – “

“No, that wouldn’t work – but we could cut up someone’s shirt and – “

“Sokka, look!” Ty Lee urged, and he did.

All of them watched as Anklebiter dove onto the platform, knocked both guards out, and tackled the warden.

“…Huh,” Hakoda commented.

“Mai, I’m so sorry,” Ty Lee uttered to her friend.

“Fuck him,” Mai replied, scowling at her uncle through the window. “Fuck all of them. I’m coming with you.”

The gondola reached the other side without further interruption, and everyone quickly got out before the guards could resume cutting the rope. Ty Lee pretended to be holding Mai hostage again to empty her airship of guards, and then all five of them were headed for the Western Air Temple.

“You guys certainly upgraded,” Suki remarked, perplexed, as they emerged from the airship. “You know, I did think Smellerbee’s story about a hunting trip was fishy, but I still didn’t expect you to come back with this thing instead of a war balloon.”

“Dad!” Katara cried, dashing forward and throwing her arms around Hakoda. “Where did you guys go?!”

“Uh…, the most secure prison in the Fire Nation?” Sokka offered.

“And you picked up crazy knife girl?” Toph demanded, pointing at Mai.

Sokka shrugged. “It was a last-minute adjustment to the plan.”

“Well, I’m going to go take a nap,” Mai declared, shouldering past everyone. “A very, very long nap. So long, in fact, that if someone felt the urge to murder me in my sleep, that would be just fine.”

“…Is crazy knife girl okay?” Toph asked as soon as Mai was inside the temple and out of earshot.

“Her uncle just tried to sacrifice her to stop us from escaping,” Jet explained. “So she’s probably gonna want some time to herself….” He brightened. “Smellerbee, Longshot, you’re never gonna guess who I met at the prison.”

As everyone broke off into smaller groups, Sokka clapped Ty Lee on the shoulder. “You know what? You’re not bad, Ty Lee. I’m glad to have you on our side.”

“Thanks, Sokka!” Ty Lee chirped, beaming.

“Hey, Ty Lee!” Aang called to her. “Do you need time to unpack or eat or something, or are you ready for that sparring match?”

Ty Lee grinned. “I’m ready!”

Chapter Text

I think about tomorrow
If I can get through tonight
I know that we’ll be alright
Can we be strong?

Can We Hang On? by Cold War Kids

Act III: The Prince

Chapter 18: Get Through Tonight

Eight days. Eight days, and somehow Zuko still couldn’t manage to confront Aang in private. Suddenly Zuko had a lot of respect for Aang for managing to get him alone so many times. He hadn’t expected it to be easy considering how many people they were living with and what high demand Aang was in as the Avatar, but eight days felt pretty ridiculous.

The first day, to be fair, he hadn’t tried that hard. It had been on his mind as they landed in the Western Air Temple, sure, but no one in Team Avatar had been willing to let him or Aang or anyone else out of their sight, and he couldn’t blame them. He felt the same way about all of them, too. The invasion had gone so horribly wrong, and any sense of security they’d developed since reuniting at Piandao’s house had been almost literally beaten out of them.

That was, incidentally, the catalyst for the obstacles that arose on the second day. Sokka, Jet, and Ty Lee had seen fit to vanish in the middle of the night, and Smellerbee’s excuse that ‘they went fishing’ was flimsy at best. Katara had coped with their sudden absence by chasing around everyone who still had injuries from the Day of Black Sun and healing them repeatedly despite anyone’s protests. Zuko, Aang, and Toph were very high on her list of victims, since all three of them had been with her fighting the Dai Li and Azula.

Aang was abducted by the Kyoshi Warriors on the third day and interrogated for information about chi. Apparently they were practicing chi-blocking on each other with the moves Ty Lee had taught them, but nothing was happening, and they thought Aang might be able to steer them in the right direction. Aang was not, however, able to provide them with the guidance they needed, and that discovery had cost them the whole day.

Zuko thought he might finally succeed on the fourth day when he asked Aang to show him around the Air Temple a bit more. However, this request was overheard by several Freedom Fighters and Kyoshi Warriors who had seen fit to sabotage Zuko by inviting themselves along for the Air Nomad-led tour. Due to the added presence, the aforementioned tour took way longer than it had any right to, and by the time it was over, dinner was being served.

The fifth day had begun so badly that Zuko didn’t even try to talk to Aang that day. When he returned to camp after his daily warm-ups, it was to this conversation:

”This isn’t like last time, Katara! I can’t just ‘meditate’ this away!”

“Aang, you still won’t even tell me what’s wrong,” Katara pressed. “I’m just trying to understand.”

“You were there,” Aang pointed out. “You know exactly what’s wrong!”

“Then why am I asking?” Katara countered, a rare thread of irritation woven into her voice. “Just to hear the sound of my own voice? Do I normally do that?”

“Do you really want him to answer that?” Toph interjected dryly.

Katara sighed. “Thanks, Toph. That’s really, really helpful.”

“Hey, I’m just being honest.”

“You saw what I did to Azula,” Aang finally bit out. “I nearly killed her!”

“Azula?!” Smellerbee barked. “That’s who you’re worried about? Really?”

“You’ve hurt people before in the Avatar State,” Suki cut in calmly. “What’s changed?”

“All those other times, I wasn’t in control of the Avatar State,” Aang explained. “This time, I was. I just wasn’t in control of myself.”

“Who cares that you weren’t in control of yourself?” Smellerbee retorted. “Did you see what she did to Zuko?”

“Yeah, Smellerbee, I did see,” Aang reminded her. “I saw more than any of you saw, and that was the problem!”

“I don’t see a problem! It would’ve been better if you had killed her; we’d all be in a lot less danger right now!”

“Maybe we should all cool off and come back to this later,” Suki suggested, looking alarmed by the direction their ensuing shouting match was taking.

“I can’t just use the Avatar State to kill whoever I want, Smellerbee! I’m an Air Nomad; Air Nomads don’t kill anyone at all if they can help it, and they definitely don’t kill for revenge!”

Longshot stepped forward and tugged gently on Smellerbee’s shoulder, but she was undeterred.

“You’re not just an Air Nomad, though! You’re the Avatar too, and the Avatar has to kill people for the greater good, and yeah, I consider evil firebenders who torture my friend to be on that list!”

“I don’t want Aang to kill anyone because of me.”

Everyone except Toph started at Zuko’s interruption as he joined them. “…You really don’t think Aang should kill Azula?” Smellerbee questioned dubiously.

“That’s not what I said. If Aang kills Azula to save the world, good for him. But if it’s just because she hurt me, that’s going to haunt him forever, and that’s what I don’t want. In this case, the ends don’t justify the motive. It has to be for the right reasons. It can’t be revenge. It can’t even be justice. It has to be necessary.”

“And you think killing Azula is necessary?” Aang challenged.

Zuko was startled by the disappointment in his voice. “It might be, yeah,” he confirmed. “Smellerbee made a good point. Whether we like it or not, Azula’s existence puts us in danger. She’s never going to stop hunting us.”

Aang looked around at all of them, scowled, and stormed off.

Suki leaned against a column, frowning pensively. “…Well, that could have gone better. Thanks for trying, though, Zuko.”

After that, Zuko had decided to give Aang space for the rest of the day. When the sixth day came, he would have been obstructed whether or not he wished to pursue Aang’s company. Smellerbee pulled him into an official Freedom Fighter meeting with Longshot and all of the other Freedom Fighters.

”Some of you have expressed concerns over our future,” Smellerbee began. “I know you’ve all been feeling restless since we’ve been stuck here, especially since the Earth Kingdom is in a worse state than ever. I talked to Suki, and she says that Team Avatar’s focus right now is helping Aang master all four elements so that he can face the Fire Lord again and save the Earth Kingdom. I called this meeting so that everyone can have a say in what that means for the Freedom Fighters in the meantime.”

“The Avatar is the world’s last hope,” one girl put forth logically, “so the best use of our efforts would be helping him and his friends in any way that we can.”

“The Freedom Fighters aren’t meant to be holed up somewhere,” one boy argued immediately. “We should be out there helping people. The Earth Kingdom needs us now more than ever!”

“The Earth Kingdom needs the Avatar,” the girl disagreed. “What if we leave now and then something happens? Where will we be then?”

“The Avatar can take care of himself and his friends are more than capable, too. Frankly, they might be better off with less people, not more.”

“Thanks, Violet, Ghost,” Smellerbee cut them off, indicating first the girl and then the boy with a nod to each of them. “Those are all good points. Does anyone else have an opinion?” She looked around, then, when no one spoke, addressed the boy next to Longshot. “Any thoughts, Brick?”

Brick shrugged, crossing his arms. “Doesn’t really matter until Jet gets back, does it?” he pointed out. “He’s going to have the final say.”

Smellerbee shook her head. “Jet and I talked about it, and we’re not doing things that way anymore,” she announced. “Jet never meant to be a dictator. We came close to doing something really awful in Gaipan – we did do something pretty awful in Gaipan, actually – and the best way to prevent us from doing that again is letting everyone have a voice, not just Jet and a few others.”

Brick thought for a moment. “…Well, I don’t know about leaving or staying, but if we do leave, we should talk to the Kyoshi Warriors first. A lot of them have been really interested in what we do, and they’re getting antsy cooped up here, too. I think some of them might want to come with us.”

Smellerbee nodded. “Okay. I’ll make sure that we do.”

“You have to stay here, right?” Zuko started upon being addressed by one of the Freedom Fighters. “To teach firebending to the Avatar?”

“Yeah,” Zuko confirmed. “But that can’t stop you guys from doing what you need to do.”

“So you think we should leave, too?” Smellerbee asked, sounding surprised.

Zuko nodded. “The next couple of weeks are pretty much our last chance to defeat the Fire Nation, and everyone here has a role to play in that. For Aang, that’s mastering all the elements. For Katara, Toph, and me, that’s teaching him our respective elements. For all of you, I’m sure that’s you belong out there, helping the Earth Kingdom as much as you can. If we fail in our part, you’re the last line of defense between the Earth Kingdom and the Fire Nation, now. I don’t want you to leave,” he added, in case there were any doubts in that respect, “but this isn’t about what any of us wants. It’s about what the rest of the world needs.”

In the end, they had agreed that the Freedom Fighters, and possibly some of the Kyoshi Warriors, would leave as soon as Jet returned. Zuko, Smellerbee, and Longshot had been reluctant to part from each other the rest of the day, seeing as they would have to soon, so Zuko didn’t bother seeking Aang out.

The seventh day had never stood a chance of giving Zuko an opportunity. Sokka, Jet, and Ty Lee had returned from their ‘fishing trip,’ which turned out to be a trip to the Boiling Rock of all places, a fact that Smellerbee had kept from them and that Toph had, for reasons unbeknownst to any of them, allowed to be kept from them. Aang had immediately pulled Ty Lee into a sparring match that had eventually devolved into a deep discussion of Air Nomad culture, so Zuko had left him to it.

Zuko woke up on the eighth day knowing that he wouldn’t have a chance to speak with Aang at least until that night, because that was the day he would be seeing Jet, Smellerbee, Longshot, and their traveling companions off. Since the day was already doomed to be terrible, Azula had naturally decided to stop by with a few airships to destroy the Western Air Temple.

As bombs rained down on them, Zuko looked up at Azula from the outskirts of their camp, and the commotion and explosions around him faded until it was just him and her, staring each other down. I’m not going to let her destroy this place, he decided, readying himself. “Guys – “

“Don’t even think about it,” Suki snapped, snatching the back of his shirt and dragging him away from the edge.

“But – “

“I’ve had it up to here with you, Blue! You’re not going anywhere - “

“She’s going to destroy this whole temple!” Zuko protested. “You have to let me go! I can stop her!”

“At what cost?” Suki demanded.

“I’m not going to sacrifice myself – “

“That’s what you said last time – “

“No, I’ve never said that before,” Zuko disagreed firmly, looking her in the eye. “This time I’m saying it, and I mean it. I’m not going to sacrifice myself. I’m just going to hold her off. No one else can do that.”

“That’s definitely what you said last time,” Suki muttered resentfully. She looked away briefly, then looked back at him, resigned. “You better make it back to us.”

“I will,” Zuko promised, and upon his release, he ran right towards the nearest airship, boosted himself off of the ground with fire, and landed in front of Azula. “What are you doing here?” he barked.

“You mean it’s not obvious yet?” Azula smiled wickedly. “I’m about to celebrate becoming an only child!” Without further ado, she sent a wave of her blue fire at him. He pushed through the fire, casting it aside with both hands, and shot three quick blasts at her feet. As she was driven closer to the other side of the airship, away from the temple, she generated lightning faster than he had ever seen her do so and directed the bolt at him.

“Same old tricks, Azula!” He reached for the bolt with one hand and pulled it down into his stomach. “Your moves are getting stale!” He let the lightning flow into his other hand and redirected it to her.

“I could say the same about you,” Azula taunted, and then she… caught the lightning, drew it to her stomach, and sent it right back at him, which, according to Iroh, was a move that his uncle had invented himself and only ever taught to Zuko. Zuko deeply resented her in that moment.

Zuko irritably caught the lightning a second time, but this time he shot it at the ground between them, setting the airship on fire. Then, using the distraction, he chanced a glance over his shoulder at the air temple to see if everyone had escaped yet. They appeared to be struggling with Appa, for some reason. When he focused on Azula again, the flames had spread and grown unnaturally quickly, taking on an azure glow. He pushed the fire away, tinting it reddish orange, and swept a great deal of it into a large fireball augmented by his own innate fire. Azula nimbly dodged, but rather than let the fireball sail past her, she caught it with one hand, rolled it along her shoulders, and pressed her own flames into it with the other hand as she volleyed it at him. It was a blatant mimicry of lightning redirection, but in truth, it bore more resemblance to a classic waterbending technique. There was something inherently awful about seeing Azula use the same move that Katara used so frequently.

Zuko broke apart the fireball in midair, revealing several shorter blasts that had been hidden behind it. As he extinguished those, the flames between him and Azula rose into a great wall and spread until it crashed into him, knocking him off of the airship. He urgently expelled fire from his feet and hands to slow his descent and looked around for the nearest platform to aim for. That was when someone slammed into him from behind, wrapped an arm around his waist, and swung them with unseen leverage onto another airship. Zuko was let go upon impact and tumbled across the surface, guarding his stomach with his knees and his face with one arm. With his other arm, he unsheathed one sword and stabbed one of the adornments on the airship to stop him from rolling off the edge. When he came to a halt, he looked up to see Longshot pushing himself to his knees, retracting one of his new grappling hook arrows from Azula’s airship. Between the fire and the puncture from said arrow, the ship was sinking fast.

Azula leapt from her airship to the remains of the Western Air Temple. A third airship headed for her to pick her up, but Longshot nocked another arrow and shot it through the sails attached to the ship, and Zuko generated lightning and expelled it into ship itself. Between the two blows, the airship may not have been sinking rapidly enough to kill anyone, but it certainly wouldn’t be rising to come after them. As their own airship veered towards her, delivering Zuko and Longshot to her, Appa’s roar from behind them alerted them to his presence. Both of them turned to see Suki, Sokka, Katara, Toph, Ty Lee, and Mai in his saddle, while Aang sat on his head with the reins. “Get on, guys!” Sokka shouted urgently.

Zuko and Longshot jumped off of the airship and onto Appa, clutching at the sides of his saddle until Sokka and Suki tugged them up. Breathless, Zuko watched as Azula, her airships, and what was left of the Western Air Temple faded into the distance. Then he looked around, frowning. The question, ‘Where are Jet and Smellerbee?’ was on the tip of his tongue, but then he realized that the Freedom Fighters and Kyoshi Warriors were absent too. They must have… taken the stolen airship together? But then…. Zuko looked to his left at Longshot, alarmed. For his part, Longshot was oddly quiet. It was a weird way to describe someone who had only spoken once in all the time Zuko had known him, but it was true. Everything about Longshot’s body language was quiet in a way that it normally wasn’t. Zuko swallowed. “Longshot, you didn’t have to do that.”

Longshot gave him a scathing look that even a perfect stranger would have been able to interpret. It said plainly, “You’re an idiot.”

“No, I mean – “ Zuko hesitated. Would it do any good to tell Longshot that Zuko could probably have gotten to the second airship on his own, or would it be detrimental to verbally render his sacrifice unnecessary? Zuko decided to keep that thought to himself and said instead, “Thanks, Longshot.”

Across from him, Mai muttered, “There’s no way this thing can carry all of us.” Her head was resting on her knees, around which her arms were wrapped.

“Mai doesn’t like heights,” Ty Lee explained to Zuko. Her own arm was wrapped around Mai’s shoulders. It was impossible for Zuko to tell if Mai was in such a state that she actually appreciated the physical contact or if she just didn’t have the energy to push Ty Lee off of her, although he considered the latter possibility much more likely.

“Me either,” Toph grunted. “At least you can see when we’re in the sky.”

“I don’t get it,” Sokka addressed Mai, sounding both amused and sympathetic. “You were fine on the airship, and that was just as high as this.”

“I trust the airship to stay in the air more than this thing,” Mai grumbled.

“Appa isn’t a ‘thing,’ he’s part of the team,” Katara corrected. “And personally, I have a lot more faith in him than I would in anything manmade. Engineers can make mistakes, but Appa’s an airbender, not just any old animal. If he does get tired, he’ll let us know, and we can stop somewhere on our way to…” She frowned. “…Hey, Aang, where are we going?”

“Uh…, good question! Any ideas?”

“I know where Azula will never look for us,” Zuko said. “Ember Island.”

Ty Lee choked on air, and Mai snorted, conceding, “You got that right.”

Ember Island was a bit far to travel in one night, especially with nine passengers, and everyone was starving anyway since they had no food. They ended up stopping on a shore on the outskirts of the Earth Kingdom halfway between the Air Temple and their destination right around nightfall. Mai muttered a series of obscene words and practically crawled out of the saddle. “Don’t worry, Mai, you’ll get used to it,” Ty Lee reassured her cheerfully.

“I do not want to get used to that,” Mai grumbled. “Should’ve just stayed at the Boiling Rock….”

Suki assigned jobs to everyone, and by some miracle, Zuko and Aang were sent alone to head south in search of plants to forage. As Aang headed over, Suki shot Zuko a wink, and Zuko realized this matchup was not thanks to luck.

“Ready?” Aang asked.

“Yeah.”

So on the ninth day – or rather, the ninth night - the two of them headed into the forest. Zuko glanced uneasily at his companion. He couldn’t tell whether or not Aang was still mad about their fight the other day. He didn’t seem like he was, but then again, he’d never seen Aang mad before, so he had nothing to compare it to. Possibly, Aang was one of those people who liked to pretend that everything was fine and never let on that they were angry, but he was usually more straight-forward than that, so he probably was not one of those people. If he was still mad, though, Zuko didn’t know what he could do about that. After all, he couldn’t exactly apologize when he was in the right. If it were a lower-stakes argument, sure, he could try and suck up his pride and apologize, but it was crucial that Aang maintain his ability to enter the Avatar State.

He supposed there was an easy, simple way to end his ponderings. “Are you still angry about the argument we had back at the Air Temple?”

Aang wilted, his usual cheer dissipating. “…No,” he admitted. “I know I’m gonna have to enter the Avatar State again. Smellerbee wasn’t completely wrong. I’m an Avatar first and an Air Nomad second. I have to restore balance, and I want to restore balance, too, and that’s gonna take the Avatar State, no matter how I feel about it…. Even if I was angry still, though, I wouldn’t be angry at you.” Aang beamed at him. “You were the only one who tried to see my side, even though you didn’t agree with me.”

“So are you ready to get back to meditating on the Avatar State?” Zuko asked, trying not to look directly at Aang’s face for fear of going blind from the brightness.

“Yeah, I am.”

“Think you’ll survive me smiling at you this time?” Zuko joked, and was rewarded with the satisfying sight of Aang turning scarlet. He felt that it made for a nice change of pace since he was always the one being caught off-guard.

Aang sputtered for a few heartbeats, then said, embarrassingly sincerely, “Probably not. You have a really nice smile.”

Now Zuko’s face was warming. “Thanks,” he coughed. Following that mortifying interaction, the two of them walked in silence for a few moments. Eventually, Zuko cleared his throat and embarked on his most challenging task yet. “So… when you kissed me, before the invasion,” he began awkwardly, “that – was that – “ Okay, this is ridiculous. “Are we dating now?” he finally asked, then cringed at his own bluntness.

Aang, for his part, tripped over nothing. Zuko managed to catch his arm before he could fall face-first, but it was a near thing. “I don’t know,” he stammered. “I mean, technically no, because we haven’t actually gone on a date yet. But we could be! I mean, we can be. Dates are a thing that we can go on. If you want. That would, um, that would be good. Great, even.”

Zuko wondered absently where all of Aang’s smoothness from the day of black sun had gone. When he shared this thought with Aang, Aang grinned sheepishly.

“I didn’t think I was smooth. I was just speaking from the heart,” Aang disagreed. ‘Embarrassingly sincere’ seemed to be the theme of the night.

“Anyway,” Zuko diverted, trying desperately to reach the end of the conversation, because he was definitely feeling too many emotions to be crammed into just a handful of minutes, “if you’d like to be dating, then I would also like to be dating.”

Aang’s eyes widened. “Wait, really?”

“Yeah. I mean, I like spending time with you, and I liked kissing you….”

“Oh,” Aang breathed. “Um, I liked both of those things, too.” He smiled. “So we’re dating now?”

“Like you said, we’re not technically dating if we haven’t gone on any dates,” Zuko reminded him teasingly. “But when all of this is over…, yeah, that sounds nice.”

“Look!” Aang pointed excitedly at a gaggle of trees ahead of them. “Lychee nuts!” He darted forward and began picking them.

Zuko followed at a more sedate pace, still thinking about what Aang had said earlier regarding their argument from the previous day. “For what it’s worth,” Zuko offered, “I think Suki and Katara were trying to see your side, too. Smellerbee shouldn’t have gone after you like that, but she has strong feelings about Azula. I mean, obviously you do too,” he amended, recalling what Aang had said about losing control when Azula was taunting them, “but – “

“Smellerbee grew up in an atmosphere where killing was just a part of life,” Aang mused. “I was angry with her at first, but more than anything, she reminded me of why I’m still fighting: to create an atmosphere where people respect and empathize with each other instead of just hating each other.”

Just before sunset the following day, Appa landed on Ember Island beside Zuko’s family’s old vacation home. “Are you sure this is safe?” Sokka questioned as everyone climbed down from the air bison.

“Azula’s not going to come here voluntarily,” Zuko assured him, “and she won’t expect me to, either. I doubt this place will even cross her mind.”

They all participated in setting up camp, and then used up the rest of their harvests from the night before to eat. Zuko was sandwiched between Toph and Mai in the haphazard circle. “We’ll have to go shopping tomorrow,” Suki mused. “Zuko, Ty Lee, Longshot, you’re the stealthiest, so you three will come with me to steal clothes for everyone. The rest of you can do the shopping.”

“Fine by me,” Sokka agreed cheerfully.

On Zuko’s right, Mai queried, “Can I steal instead of shopping?”

“You’d rather sneak into someone’s home then go shopping?” Suki checked. At Mai’s nod, she shrugged. “Well, okay. You’re pretty stealthy. Would someone else rather go shopping – “

“I would!” Ty Lee volunteered immediately. “Sorry, Mai.”

Mai waved a hand dismissively.

As everyone tucked into their meal, Suki sidled around the campfire until she was right next to Toph. She scooted forward and leaned across Toph’s lap to address Zuko. “How did that talk go with Aang last night?” she asked quietly, her eyes gleaming.

“Excuse me?” Ty Lee, who sat on Mai’s right, leaned in front of her friend to join the conversation. “What talk?”

“If you three are gonna gossip, go do it somewhere else,” Toph grumbled.

Suki scowled at her. “Easy for you to say! You got a front row seat to their other talk during the invasion!”

“You think I wanted that?” Toph griped. “I couldn’t tell what they were saying, anyway. I could only tell that Aang kissed him.”

“Whatweren’t,” Suki echoed excitedly. “Does that mean you are now?”

“You two would be cute together,” Ty Lee enthused.

“Okay, first of all,” Zuko gestured to Ty Lee, “I don’t even know what that means, and second of all, I repeat, not your business.” With the second point, he gestured to both of them.

“This is totally my business,” Suki argued, maintaining a low volume so the rest of the group wouldn’t hear. “I’ve been rooting for you two for half a year – also, I arranged your talk with Aang last night. This isn’t even gossiping, this is just getting a return on my investments.”

“I’m just gossiping,” Ty Lee put in amicably.

“If you don’t start respecting my personal space soon, I’m going to push you into the campfire,” Mai threatened.

“Zuko will extinguish me!” Ty Lee declared optimistically. At Zuko’s fiery glare, she amended, “Or Aang. Probably Aang.”

“Yeah, well, Aang can’t redirect lightning yet,” Zuko warned her. “And I don’t think your knowledge of chi paths extends to redirecting lightning, either.”

Ty Lee gulped, leaned backwards, and scooted away.

“If I tell you that Aang and I decided to start dating as soon as we’re out of hiding,” Zuko sighed, “will you leave me and my love life alone?”

“Yes!” Suki beamed and accommodatingly retreated back to her seat between Longshot and Sokka.

The next day, once everyone had fulfilled their respective tasks, Zuko took it upon himself to remedy Aang’s particularly detrimental lack of knowledge in one area of firebending. “Lightning generation is all about detaching yourself from your emotions,” he explained. “From what you’ve told me, it’s a lot like entering the Avatar State in that way. I’m hoping that if I teach you this before you try to meditate on the Avatar State, you’ll be better prepared.”

“I’m ready, Sifu Hotman,” Aang announced solemnly.

Zuko pinched the bridge of his nose. “Aang, you calling me Sifu Hotman, which you know irritates me, is not helping me detach from my emotions.”

Aang looked abashed. “Oh, right. Sorry. I’m ready, Zuko.”

Longshot stepped towards them and held out a tray of teacups.

“Thanks, Longshot,” Zuko said gratefully. He and Aang accepted one cup of tea each. Ty Lee, who sat cross-legged watching them, accepted a cup as well with her own words of gratitude.

“This is really good!” Aang exclaimed after taking a sip.

Longshot inclined his head in acceptance of the compliment and moved on to other areas around camp to offer tea to the rest of their companions.

“The first step in generating lightning is that detachment. The second step is locating the positive and negative energy within you. The third step is to separate those energies, which is much harder than the first two. I’ve found that it helps to visualize the ocean and moon spirits from the spirit oasis in the North Pole, but you might not need to visualize anything, since you have more of a spiritual background than I do. Once you successfully separate those energies, the fourth step is the most dangerous. Negative energy and positive energy are inherently drawn to each other. Once separated, they need to be released so that they can snap back to each other. Their collision is what generates the lightning. We, as firebenders, are not ever fully in control of that lightning. We can only guide it.”

“Actually, that’s not completely true!” Ty Lee piped up, then winced. “Sorry, Zuko. I didn’t mean to interrupt….”

“Go on.” Zuko gestured off-handedly for her to continue.

“I don’t know how, exactly, but Azula can control the intensity of her lightning. Er, not the intensity, but the… severity, maybe? Or the force – no, that’s not right either. Hmm….” Ty Lee rested her chin in one hand and tapped a finger against her cheek. “Well, anyway, she can decide if the lightning is weak or if it’s strong – oh, strength! That’s the word I was looking for. She can control the strength of her lightning. She can set something on fire, or she can char it completely in one shot, and she can give someone a light zap or – well, I’ve never seen her kill someone, but she could probably kill someone with it outright!”

“That’s… actually helpful. Thanks, Ty Lee.”

“No problem! Glad I could help!”

“That’s something to think about later. For now, Aang, whatever strength you summon in your lightning is fine. We can train together to figure out how to predetermine the strength. Now, this is what you do….” He demonstrated the motions that Iroh had showed him what felt like a lifetime ago, but was in reality only two or three months ago.

Aang closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and mimicked those motions. As he pointed to a nearby tree that they’d chosen for target practice, a tiny cloud of smoke burst forth from his fingertips. Frowning, Aang tried again. This time, the tiny cloud of smoke was somehow even smaller.

“…Okay,” Zuko said slowly, rubbing his face. “That’s… the exact opposite of what happened to me.” He thought for a moment. “It looks like you didn’t generate any lightning at all, so let’s focus on that problem. Did you try envisioning the two fish in that oasis?”

“Yeah, but… I didn’t like trying to separate them,” Aang confessed. “They’re the ocean and moon spirits, y’know? They belong together! It’s not right to separate them.”

“Magnitude,” Ty Lee gasped suddenly. “That’s the word!” Aang and Zuko shot her a curious look and an irritated look respectively, and she coughed awkwardly. “Sorry! Continue!”

“Maybe you should think of something else,” Zuko recommended, internally reeling from Aang’s overly sentimental explanation.

Aang narrowed his eyes in concentration. “…I’m going to think about onion and banana juice instead.”

Zuko wished, not for the first time, that there was almost any other firebender around to teach Aang this technique. “Right. I’m sure that’ll be fine.”

Time after time, however, Aang encountered the same type of problem:

“If it was just onion juice or just banana juice, it wouldn’t help with unlocking chakras!”

“I know we can’t drink water unless Katara and Toph filter it, but I like mud better than just water or just earth anyway! It’s extra cool because I’m the only person in the world who can really bend it completely.”

“Look, why would anyone want a koala or a sheep instead of a koala sheep? I mean, they’re so cute!”

Zuko massaged his temples frustratedly enough to possibly be causing himself an even worse headache. “They come back together,” he insisted, aghast. “You’re not keeping them separate. It’s only for a couple of seconds!”

“It’s possible,” Ty Lee suggested timidly, “that Aang just isn’t built for lightningbending.”

“Bubbles here has a point,” contributed Toph, referencing Ty Lee. Toph had joined them a few attempts ago, by all appearances with the sole intention of mocking Aang through silent facial expressions alone. Zuko didn’t even understand how a blind girl who had never seen a face could do that. Was her earthbending-sight really that detailed, or did she just memorize people’s reactions to the various expressions she made? “I mean, we all know how Aang trying to metalbend went.”

Aang winced. “I still have bruises on my knuckles….”

“In Aang’s defense,” interjected Katara, who had joined them specifically to counter Toph’s judgmental presence with her own supportiveness and optimism, “punching metal repeatedly was probably not the best way for him to learn.”

Toph shrugged. “Hey, that’s how I learned.”

“They might be right,” Zuko admitted.

“No!” Aang burst out. “I can do this. I just have to think of the right thing – “

“It’s probably less about what you’re picturing and more about your temperament in general,” Zuko sighed, trying not to sound as disappointed as he felt. He should have expected this, in all honesty. “You’re an airbender, and you have an airbender nature. Maybe that nature just isn’t compatible with lightningbending, like metalbending. Not every firebender can bend lightning anyway; it’s incredibly rare.”

“You’ve mastered two elements and are well on your way to mastering the other two,” Katara added encouragingly. “There’s no reason to get frustrated over this one thing.”

Aang groaned. “Yeah, I guess you two are right….”

“If it means that much to you, we can try again another time,” Zuko proposed, “once you’ve had more time to think about the ideas behind it.”

“In the meantime, you could teach him the basics of lightning redirection?” Ty Lee said to Zuko. “I could almost teach him myself from having seen it so much, but it would probably come better from you since you’ve actually, y’know, done it.”

“’Redirection’ sounds much more like Twinkle Toes’ style,” Toph agreed, and got splashed by Katara in defense of Aang.

“Toph’s probably right,” Aang admitted sheepishly as Toph sent a ripple through the earth from her to Katara, knocking the waterbender off her feet. “Let’s do lightning redirection!”

“First, you have to reach out with one hand to… catch the lightning, for lack of a better word.” Katara soaked Toph’s hair and froze it in an absurdly spiky hairstyle. It wasn’t much in the way of either offense or defense, but it did make Katara, Ty Lee, Aang, and even Toph start snickering. Aang, at least, had the manners to keep his snickering to a low, less obtrusive volume. Zuko closed his eyes briefly, summoning the dregs of his patience. “Then you have to carry the lightning into your stomach.”

“Uh-huh.” Toph retaliated with a boulder; Katara drove two ice spikes into the boulder and broke it apart. To his credit, Aang did his best to keep his eyes on Zuko, but his gaze was slightly unfocused and kept flicking back over to the ensuing sparring match.

“It’s crucial that you remember that,” Zuko emphasized. Ice streaked across the ground from Katara to Toph; Toph knocked the ice off-course by disrupting the ground between them. “If the lightning passes through your heart, it could kill you.”

“Right. I gotcha.”

One of Zuko’s eyes started twitching. Giving in, he scorched the ground between Toph and Katara, igniting a flame that he maintained remotely. Toph and Katara started and looked up at him. “I am trying to teach the world’s last hope a technique that will kill him if he does it the wrong way,” he ground out. “Either settle down or go away.”

They seemed vaguely abashed, but not at all intimidated by either his firebending or his glare. Clearly he was losing his touch. “Sorry, Sifu Hotman,” they chorused at him.

The three observers did, at least, oblige him, and Zuko was able to finish the lightning-redirection explanation without further external input. When he and Aang had practiced the technique together until Aang had the motion down properly, Zuko said, “Great job, Aang. I think that’s enough practice for now – “

“Are we going to try the real thing now?” Aang interrupted excitedly. Dead silence reigned over the group as everyone stared at Aang. “…What?”

“You want me to shoot lightning at you,” Zuko stated incredulously. “You want me to strike you with lightning?”

Aang shifted uncertainly. “Well…, yeah! You know, to make sure that I can do it here so that I won’t die if I try it in a real fight.”

“And if you can’t do it here, then you die here,” Zuko pointed out.

Aang deflated. “Oh. Right.”

“How about this?” Katara suggested. “Zuko said before that his uncle invented it based on waterbending. If I attack you with water, you should be able to redirect it the same way you would redirect lightning.”

Aang perked up. “That’s a great idea, Katara!”

Thus Zuko passed teaching duty off to Katara. As he walked back to their camp, considering pulling Sokka aside to spar with swords instead of bending, Mai exited her tent, spotted him, and made a beeline for him. “Hey, Zuko. Can we talk?”

Mai had never once in Zuko’s life actively sought conversation. “Sure,” Zuko agreed, intrigued.

The two of them meandered further down the beach from their camp in the opposite direction of Aang and the others. Mai considered him for a couple of moments, her gaze sharp, and finally said, “I didn’t know you’d been brainwashed.” The statement was such a non-sequitur that for a moment, Zuko wasn’t sure what she was talking about. Seeing this on his face, Mai added helpfully, “Before Azula took over the city and imprisoned you in the Fire Nation. I wasn’t part of the brainwashing in Lake Laogai. All Azula told me was where to go and what to do, and that when her plan was over, Ba Sing Se and the Avatar would have fallen. I mean, I didn’t ask, either. I didn’t care what she was doing.”

Zuko had never truly considered Mai’s role in everything beyond a vague assumption that she had been in on whatever Azula and Ty Lee had planned, so while the revelation did not specifically negate that assumption, it still surprised him a little. “I see.”

“If I had known that Azula’s plan included capturing you and bringing you back to the Fire Nation where she could do what she liked,” Mai continued ruefully, “I would have done something about it. I don’t know if I could have succeeded without putting my life and my freedom on the line with yours, and I don’t think I would have taken that kind of risk, but I would have done something, for what it’s worth. I would have at least tried.”

“I wouldn’t have expected that,” Zuko replied honestly. “We didn’t see each other for years, after all, and it’s not like we were especially close before I was banished.”

Mai shrugged. “Maybe if I’d thought she would just throw you into a jail cell and be done with you, I wouldn’t have. Once you actively sided against her, though, I knew exactly what would happen if she ever caught you.”

Zuko hummed. “Well…, thanks.”

“Don’t thank me.” Mai snorted. “I didn’t do anything, after all. I just thought you should know that I wasn’t part of any of that.”

“Hey, guys!” Ty Lee shouted from just beyond their camp. “Lunch is ready!”

Zuko and Mai retreated to their friends’ company. Aang waved Zuko over to a seat around the campfire between Aang and Katara which had been saved for him.

“What’s the plan for tomorrow?” Ty Lee asked the group at large.

“I felt some scam artists in the marketplace earlier,” Toph quickly announced.

“No,” Katara rejected just as quickly.

“I thought you were cool with that now! It worked out well enough back in that other city,” Toph complained. “Oh, man, I still wish I could have stuck around long enough for the guards to find out I’d busted out of that metal cell they put me in.”

“Yes, that was fun,” Katara conceded, “and maybe - maybe - we could do it again someday, but do you really think we should be drawing attention to ourselves right now? Here, in the Fire Lord’s old vacation spot?”

“…Okay, that’s fair,” Toph allowed. “What else is there to do in town?”

“I’m so glad you asked!” Sokka exclaimed, hastily withdrawing parchment from his satchel –

“If that’s another schedule, I’m breaking up with you,” Suki threatened.

“It’s not,” Sokka promised, but the sudden gleam in his eyes promised that there would soon be a schedule regardless of Suki’s warning. “Check it out!” He displayed a poster for a play called The Boy in the Iceberg, depicting clear parodies of Aang, Suki, Sokka, Katara, Toph, and Zuko.

“Hang on a second,” Ty Lee objected. “If that’s a poster for a show about us, then where are Longshot and I in this poster? And Jet? And Smellerbee?”

“We didn’t really travel with any of you guys,” Sokka reasoned. “…The three of them are in the character list, though.”

Ty Lee huffed. “Rude.”

(She would soon come to appreciate her absence from the play.)

“No way.” Zuko wrinkled his nose in disgust as he registered the cast that had been credited with the play. “The Ember Island Players? My mother used to take me to see them. They butchered Love Amongst the Dragons every year. I never understood why they were so popular.”

“I can’t believe our options for entertainment are ‘become criminals’ and ‘attend a play about ourselves,’” Katara complained. “Have any of you ever considered subtlety?”

“Absolutely not,” Toph said pleasantly. “I vote for ‘become criminals.’”

“It’s not until tomorrow night,” Sokka pointed out. “We have time for both!”

“Didn’t we rule out ‘become criminals?’” Aang reminded everyone, glancing nervously at the steadily rising frustration on Katara’s face. “Like Katara said, this is a particularly dangerous place to draw attention to ourselves….” His face brightened. “I don’t think it’s too dangerous to go to the play, though! We’re all wearing disguises anyway.”

Sokka turned to Zuko. “Just because they butchered that one play doesn’t mean they butcher every play, right? Don’t you think it’d be fun to see a play about us?”

Zuko did not particularly see the appeal, but Sokka seemed intent on getting a ‘yes’ out of him. “I… I guess…?”

Immediately, Sokka turned back to Katara, eyes wide as he gestured dramatically at Zuko. “You can’t possibly say ‘no’ to Zuko! The poor guy’s never had fun in his life!”

“Wait a second,” Zuko interjected. He hadn’t realized he was enlisting as a weapon in Sokka’s arsenal of persuasion tactics.

Aang eagerly joined Sokka’s argument. “Zuko told me once that the only things he’s ever done for fun are make tea and plot his father’s demise!” he insisted, which was, while not exactly what Zuko had said at the time, true all the same.

“Zuko’s not going to be heartbroken if we don’t see a play by a cast that he doesn’t like,” Suki deadpanned. “That being said….” She tilted her head contemplatively at Katara. “If the Ember Island Players are popular, most of the people around here are probably going to see the play. It might end up being more suspicious if we haven’t seen the play.”

“I didn’t even think of that,” Katara admitted. “Well… if everyone wants to see it, I’m not going to stop us.”

“Great!” Aang exclaimed. He reached past Zuko and Katara to high-five Sokka.

With lunch finished, everyone began parting from the campfire and each other to their own respective pursuits. Zuko made to go after Sokka to see about that sparring match, but he felt a tug on his sleeve and turned to Aang, who stood behind him. “What is it?” he asked.

Aang fidgeted with his hands, looking embarrassed. “…I was thinking – “

Zuko waited for the end of that sentence, but Aang showed no signs of continuing, having been struck speechless by some unknown factor. “What were you thinking?” he prompted.

Aang closed his eyes, breathed deeply, and nodded seemingly to himself. Then he finally finished his sentence. “Since everyone’s kind of taking the day off tomorrow…, I know we agreed to wait until all this was over before we started dating, but I was thinking that maybe just one date would be nice. Just one, so that we know what we’re looking forward to – or, I mean, I’m looking forward to it - !” He turned pink. At this point, it occurred to Zuko that it might be more convenient for Aang if he just stayed pink. His body must have been doing an awful lot of work adjusting the color of his face so frequently.

“I’m looking forward to it, too,” Zuko reassured him. He had hardly considered Aang’s words before he found himself agreeing. “And you’re right. That does sound nice.”

Aang’s whole body seemed to relax with the gratification, and his demeanor shifted from embarrassed to delighted. “Great! I saw this food place with vegetarian options while we were out shopping earlier. Do you want to have lunch there tomorrow, before the play?”

“Sure,” Zuko replied, and then, feeling that that wasn’t enthusiastic enough, added more passionately, “I can’t wait!”

Judging by the smile Aang wore, Zuko’s response had cumulatively been more than enthusiastic enough. He swallowed harshly. His heart was doing stupid, stupid things in his chest, and his throat, and his stomach, somehow all at the same time.

Several moments later, when Aang had gone in another direction and Zuko had wandered off aimlessly, rendered absent-minded by the discussion, it hit him that he had never been on a date before. He stopped in his tracks, wondering if there were any particular social customs he would need to follow on a date that did not need to be followed under other circumstances. If there were any, obviously he had never been exposed to them. It did cross his mind that Aang likely hadn’t been either, but then it crossed his mind that social customs, at least the most widely-followed ones, were generally dictated by natural human instinct. Zuko did not normally have the same natural human instincts as everyone else, but Aang did, which meant that Zuko should probably set about learning those social customs.

Immediately, he wished that Jet were around. Jet regularly made a complete fool of himself in Zuko’s opinion, but despite that, Zuko was pretty sure he had rather extensive dating experience which would have come in handy right about now. Both Sokka and Suki must have known about dating, though, and what Katara lacked in that area (as far as Zuko knew, anyway) she made up for with higher emotional intelligence.

Zuko decided to seek Suki out first, but to his dismay, he found her in hushed conversation with Sokka, Katara, and Aang. Well. That rules out… all three of my candidates. In horror, Zuko realized that, outside of Longshot, who Zuko wouldn’t want to force into a speaking conversation, and Mai and Ty Lee, who would be unspeakably awkward to address in this matter, there was only one person left at camp who he could talk to about going on a date with Aang.

With that, he slowly, somberly made his way towards Toph, who was blessedly alone.

“Toph,” he said, “I just want to preface this by saying I’m so sorry for the question I’m about to ask you, and that I hate it as much as you will, and that I understand if you never want to speak to me again after.”

“Oh, no,” Toph breathed, flopping backwards onto the ground. “Not this. Anything but this.”

“Toph, have you… ever been on a date?”

Toph was silent for so long, Zuko feared it would be his only answer, which would be, in his opinion, well-deserved for asking such a question of her in the first place. However, after nearly a full minute passed, Toph finally whispered, “What I say to you right now never reaches anyone else’s ears. Ever. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” Zuko sighed in relief. “I promise, Toph, never.”

Toph paused. “…Yes.”

“Yes? Yes what?” Zuko’s eyes widened. “Wait, yes as in yes, you’ve been on a date before?”

“…Yes.”

Zuko breathed another, heavier sigh of relief, feeling his whole body relax with the motion. “Oh, thank god. Everyone else is actively talking to Aang right now, you were my last hope. Oh, uh, no offense.”

“None taken.” Toph groaned. “I’d be my last hope too.”

“So – can you – can you tell me anything about going on dates? Like, what am I supposed to do? What are we supposed to talk about?”

Toph frowned. “Well, the one date I went on was with a boy who used to go to that underground fight club I was part of back home. I don’t think we did or said anything special. We were just, you know, kind of hanging out.”

Zuko deflated. “But… Aang and I already hang out.”

“Not alone, though, right?”

Zuko considered this. “I guess… not really?”

“So then, that’s the difference.” Toph seemed to think that was enough, but Zuko couldn’t help but feel like he was missing something. Everyone else his age had always talked about dates like they were some great big deal. There had to be more to it than that.

A loud sigh erupted from behind him, and Zuko jumped out of his skin before whirling around, terrified that he’d been caught out by the wrong people. However, it was just Mai, with Ty Lee and Longshot at her side. “I can’t believe I’m about to do this,” Mai muttered. “But… I have some advice, too.”

“You do?” Zuko perked up. At this point, he was willing to hear from just about anyone. “You’ve been on dates?”

“No, but my father always had a lot to say about how a date should go. For example, he always said any boy worth anything will bring you flowers on a date, especially a first date. So you should probably do that.”

“Hang on, but what if Aang brings him flowers too?” Ty Lee pointed out. “I went on a date once, and I brought her flowers, but she brought me flowers too. Then we both got really confused, and I think we each ended up going home with the same flowers we’d brought.”

Mai frowned. “Huh. I didn’t even think of that. Zuko, you should go ask Aang if he’s bringing flowers.”

“What?!” Toph shot upright. “No, no, definitely don’t do that! You know how Twinkle Toes is. If Zuko asks him that, he’ll say ‘yes’ and then he’ll go all neurotic about picking out the perfect flowers or something. I bet he’ll find a volcano to climb into just to get some panda lilies or something.”

Longshot tugged on each of his sleeves pointedly.

“Oh, thank you,” Zuko said, relieved. “I didn’t even think about what I was going to wear.”

Longshot gestured to himself and Mai.

“Fine, I’ll help,” Mai sighed. “I signed up to go stealing clothes anyway, after all.”

“What else did your father say, Mai?” Zuko asked hopefully.

“That a boy should always hold the door open for you, pull your chair out for you – “

“Mai, I don’t think a lot of your dad’s advice applies to same-sex dating,” Ty Lee said bluntly.

“Zuko, I don’t say this often because it doesn’t do jack shit for me, but I want you to look at me right now, because I think you need to.” Zuko turned to face Toph, who even turned to face him – or at least aim her face in his general direction. “Do you see how serious I am right now? Serious expression, right? For being taken seriously?”

“Yes?” Zuko said, a bit confused.

“Okay, good. Now listen to me very, very closely. Do not listen to these weirdos. Do not start acting weird around him tomorrow. Aang asked you on a date because he likes you the way you are. Don’t go changing yourself to make him like you more. That will not work. Okay?”

“Okay,” Zuko agreed. “That’s… surprisingly helpful. Thanks, Toph.”

Ty Lee pouted. “Well, I’m still helping dress you!”

Longshot nodded emphatically, a sparkle of excitement in his eyes.

Zuko wondered just what he had signed up for.

“Please say I can be done,” Zuko sighed as Longshot fussed over his outfit.

Longshot cast him a look of deep disappointment.

Zuko wilted. “Fine. Just… hurry up, alright? I don’t want to be late.”

“Be late?” Toph snorted. “You never even set a time for this thing.”

“Well, yeah, but I don’t want Aang to be out there just waiting for me.”

Longshot finally, finally stepped back, gave Zuko a onceover, and nodded slowly to himself. Then he shot Zuko a pleased thumbs-up.

“Wait!” Ty Lee shouted, bursting into the tent with her eyes covered. “Can I look? Say I can look!”

“You can look,” Zuko said, certain he was about to regret those words.

Ty Lee lowered her hand and looked him over, eyes widening. “Wow. I might not be into your whole half of the population, but even I can see that you clean up nice, Fire Lord!”

“Thanks?”

“There’s just one finishing touch….” She held up a small token, a jade belt hook decorated with white cicada cricket motifs. “I saw this in the market and it made me think of you. The cicada cricket represents happiness and fighting spirit, after all. One thing that you already have, and one thing that… well, I hope you will have, once we beat your dad up.”

Zuko thought he might already have a little of that, but the thought was so startling and unfamiliar to him that the words to say so got caught in his throat, and he failed to voice them before the moment had passed.

“Do you want to… try it on?” Ty Lee asked hopefully.

“I would love to,” Zuko told her earnestly, already undoing his belt so that he could replace his current belt hook with it.

He exited the tent, but found that Aang had not yet exited his own. “I can feel his heart racing from here,” Toph muttered exasperatedly. “Wait here, Sparky. I’ll go get him.”

Toph barged into Aang’s tent. Shortly after, a ripple of earthbending sent Suki, Sokka, and Katara all flying out of said tent, but strangely, not Aang himself. “Toph said we were taking too long, so she kicked us out,” Sokka muttered, brushing himself off as he stood up.

Suki whistled. “Damn, Blue. You don’t look anything like that scruffy little kid I saw scuttling into his tent an hour ago.”

“You kept me there for an hour?” Zuko asked Longshot, outraged. Longshot shrugged unrepentantly.

Katara squealed. “Oh, Zuko, you look so handsome! I’m so excited for this!”

“Why are you people so invested in my love life?” Zuko wondered sullenly.

Aang was, at that moment, shoved unceremoniously from his own tent, with Toph close behind. Zuko flushed as he took in Aang’s appearance. “You, uh, you look good,” he managed, and then, at a look from Longshot, quickly added, “Um, really good?”

Longshot smacked himself in the forehead, but Aang smiled nervously. “Um, you too,” he said. “Like, really really good.”

“Great!” Toph said mockingly. “Now that that’s out of the way, get out of here, you two!”

Aang made an aborted motion with his hand. Recognizing the gesture for what it was, Zuko held out his hand, valiantly ignoring the cooing noises his friends made at that. Turning scarlet, Aang gingerly reached out and clasped Zuko’s hands in his. “Alright, we’re leaving,” Zuko announced, flashing their friends a middle finger as he pulled Aang out of the clearing. “Come on, Aang. Show me where this restaurant is.”

An hour later saw them sitting at the restaurant, picking at their food as Aang told Zuko more about his childhood. “From then on, it was a tradition to play one round of airball every time Osen got distracted during meditation.” Aang shrugged sheepishly. “Well, it was supposed to be one round, but someone always wanted a rematch – usually Osen….” He hesitated, then asked, “Do you have anything like that? Any traditions, or… games? Anything… not terrible?”

Zuko paused for a moment, trying to think. Most of the games of his childhood had been filled with Azula’s cruelty, or his father’s. At the very least, they had been teasing, always at his expense. However…. “One time my mother was babysitting for Mai’s parents while Azula was out with our father,” he said. “We had a knife-throwing competition in the throne room while Mother wasn’t looking.”

“And?” Aang leaned forward expectantly.

Zuko laughed. “I lost, horribly. Mai’s been an expert with those things for as long as I can remember. I think her uncle taught her when she was young.”

“Well, I’m glad she’s on our side now.”

Zuko froze. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought he heard suspiciously familiar laughter from behind him.

“I would love to learn how to throw knives someday. Hey, I bet Toph could do it with metalbending – “

Zuko quickly shushed him, then, mindful of his tone, added apologetically, “Sorry, sorry! I just – think I hear something. Hang on a sec – “ He lifted his porcelain cup just high enough for it to reflect the people sitting behind him. Sure enough, he saw three people with their backs to him, two with familiar brown ponytails and one with a familiar brown braid. Ty Lee, Sokka, and Suki, he thought darkly. He wondered if they were the only two. “We’re being watched,” he informed Aang.

Aang’s entire demeanor changed in an instant, shifting from cheerful to deadly serious. “Azula?” he asked.

Zuko choked. “What? No! No, that’s – you know what, I can see how you would come to that conclusion. No, sorry, by Ty Lee, Sokka, and Suki.”

Aang stared at him for a several seconds, then burst into relieved laughter. “That’s… so much… better,” he got out between laughs. After a few moments, he managed to compose himself, amusement giving way to incredulity. “So, what? Are they all just sitting here spying on us?” he hissed, a rare note of irritation in his voice.

“I think so,” Zuko replied, torn between outrage and something like fondness as he spotted Katara’s distinctive hairstyle beside Longshot’s Fire Nation hat. It didn’t surprise him that neither Mai nor Toph were anywhere to be found. “We have the absolute nosiest friends in the entire world.”

“Well, forget that,” Aang huffed. He grinned. “I have an idea. Do you trust me?”

“Of course,” Zuko replied, startled.

Aang beamed. Then he flagged down the waiter. “Excuse me, sir, sorry to trouble you, but do you have to-go boxes?”

A little while later, Aang and Zuko both had their food packed up. “On the count of three, we’re gonna run,” Aang said quietly.

“Run?” Zuko laughed. “Run where?”

Aang smiled mischievously. “We’ll figure that out later. Ready?”

“Ready?” Zuko echoed incredulously. “Well – I guess so.”

“Alright. One, two…, three!”

The two of them snatched their food, grasped each other’s hands, and made a break for it, dashing out of the restaurant. Startled by the laugher coming from his own throat, Zuko giddily followed Aang as the airbender wove between vendors, nimble even without using his airbending. The only time he tripped up was bumping a little too roughly against someone’s vegetable stand, spilling cabbages everywhere (”My cabbages!” the poor vendor had wailed).

As they ran, Zuko listened closely for any pursuers, but evidently their friends had decided it wasn’t worth it to chase them seeing as the jig was up anyway, for he heard nothing but startled exclamations from vendors. “Aang!” he called out.

Aang slowed down, craning his neck to look over his shoulder at Zuko. “Yeah?”

“Follow me!”

Still running, though he wasn’t sure why (except that he was having the best time, feeling younger than he had in years), Zuko led Aang out of the marketplace and into the forest. Then he took them through the forest, tracing a track that to the best of his knowledge, only he had ever known. Finally they emerged at the top of a hill, just as the sun had begun to brush against the horizon.

“Wow,” Aang breathed.

“Maybe this is a better place for our date anyway,” Zuko suggested hopefully.

Aang beamed at him, and no words were needed. The two of them sat together and finished their food and their date there on that hill, watching the sun climb down, down, down into the ocean, until it was time to meet up with their friends for The Boy in the Iceberg.

”I am the Blue Spirit, guardian of the Avatar, here to protect you on your journey to master the four elements!

“Is that really what happened?” Ty Lee asked curiously.

“What? No!”

“I mean, obviously it didn’t happen exactly like that – I’m sure you didn’t burst into being in a mist-filled clearing – “

“No, that’s not how it happened at all! I was on that island to kidnap him!”

“That’s pretty much how it happened,” Aang said to Ty Lee conspiratorially.

“No, it isn’t!”

”Oh, no! Prince Zuko is on his way! Blue Spirit, please, help me get away!

“Wait a second.” Zuko frowned. “How am I on the way… when I’m right there?”

“I didn’t know you could multiply yourself,” Sokka sniggered. “Why don’t you do that more often? It’d be pretty useful having two of you.”

“God, are you kidding? That’s twice the amount of time spent making sure he doesn’t get himself killed,” Toph scoffed.

Zuko scowled. “…I hate you all.”

”Oh, Jet, you’re so bad.”

“Okay, well, I know that’s fake, because Jet was never that smooth.” Zuko glanced at Katara. “Right?”

The flush on Katara’s cheeks was the only response.

“…Oh Agni,” Zuko breathed. “Did you – Were you – Did you actually have a thing for him? You fell for that smug asshole? I mean, he’s one of my best friends, but seriously?”

“I was… younger then,” Katara defended herself.

“Oh, yeah?” Suki taunted. “Is that why I saw you making eyes at him the other day – ?”

“Shut up, Suki!” Katara flushed even darker. “You know what, you, as my brother’s girlfriend, do not get to do this to me. Nope. Absolutely not.”

”Through the power of friendship, I, former Prince Zuko, finally see the light about what kind of person I want to be. Thank you, Net, Longknot, and Spellerbee.”

Longshot raised a disdainful eyebrow at Zuko, gesturing to the poster in his hands.

“I know. Somehow they got your name right on the poster and not in the actual freaking show.” Zuko shook his head. “Classic Ember Island Players.”

”How could the Avatar and his friends do this to me? I will avenge you, Ty Lee, if it’s the last thing I do!”

“…Did they just kill me off?” Ty Lee exclaimed in disbelief.

“Well, they couldn’t show one of the Princess’s closest allies betraying her,” Zuko pointed out. “Even if everyone knows that from the wanted posters anyway.”

”Katara, the truth is, I don’t see you as a sister at all. You’re the love of my life.”

“That is not what happened!” Aang cried, distressed. “Zuko, that never happened, I promise you!”

“That would never happen – ever, I swear!” Katara added, looking alarmed at the prospect that Aang would practically cheat on him.

“I believe you,” Zuko told him, barely holding back laughter.

“How could they do this to me,” Aang moaned quietly.

“I love this show,” Toph declared.

”Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation, I am the Blue Spirit, here to rescue you so that you can teach the Avatar firebending!”

“That’s so rude! That was me!” Ty Lee fumed.

“It couldn’t be you, you’re dead,” Toph pointed out.

“Didn’t the Blue Spirit die in the North Pole anyway?” Mai pointed out. “Like, did they just completely forget their own plotline halfway through the story?”

“What plotline?” Ty Lee muttered sarcastically.

“I hate the Ember Island Players,” Zuko announced passionately as they walked back to their camp after the show. “I’m never seeing another show by them. When I’m Fire Lord, I’m going to have them banished from all Fire Nation theatres.”

“Aw, Zuko’s going on his first power trip,” Sokka cooed.

Mai rolled her eyes. “Can you blame him after that ending?”

“Hey, what are you even complaining about? You’re the only one who got to live!” Katara exclaimed.

“Yeah, as some kind of damsel in distress that Azula had to save!” Mai protested. “No thanks! Just kill me with the rest of you next time.”

Everyone laughed. Despite the grim ending of the show, Zuko couldn’t help but have a warm feeling spreading through his chest and stomach. He knew that the ending in the real world would be better. It had to be, because he was going to make it so. His friends deserved all the happiness in the world, and he would do whatever it took to acquire that for them… and maybe even for himself, too.

By morning, the warm feeling would be gone.

Along with Aang.