Obstacles are put in your way to see if what you want, is really worth fighting for.

She only wanted one thing, one thing that was so close, but still so far away.

Freedom.

The fire danced at her heels, and kissed her tear stained cheeks, as the red flags on the wall stared her down and suffocated the air she breathed.

"Traitor," The word hissed into her ear, as it melted away her courage, and made the bitter tears on her eyes sting.

Freedom beckons her with wide open arms, as the smell of fire burns under her nose and there is a red puddle at her feet. The door cracks open, and she can feel the desire in her chest screaming at her body to escape.

There is just one thing in between her and that entrance to a new beginning.

Her name is Princess Azula.

All she can hear is the echo of her footsteps, running and dodging the blasts of blue fire which narrowly miss her and skim across her pale body.

But guilt and regret from a past she did not want; weigh her down and she slips into a pool of red which match her aura so very well.

"You will pay, for what you have done!"

Azula hisses once more, and as she nears, so does the fear that haunts her every night.

But, Azula doesn't know. She doesn't know that she already pays for her past, every single moment of her life. The tears she cries every night are sins that she never meant to happen, and they are for every chance she didn't run away when she had the chance.

She will pay.

And she has been paying.

Regret knows her so very well. It curls inside her chest as she stares at her blood stained hands, and it taunts her every night to sleep, and it will be there till the day she can't feel anymore.

Because now, freedom is not free.

Ty Lee lost that chance so very long ago, and she is paying for it now.

It's then when she closes her eyes, waiting for the blow to remove her from this misery, when she is visited by her memories once again.

And it's then, when she feels the heat coming toward her face and when she cries out a scream.

Somehow she heard it, somehow she heard through her beating heart and the sound of burning flames. The sound of metal against flesh, as the sound of a screech tears at her soul, and the sound of a voice.

A hand is at her face, and she immediately knows who it is.

Mai.

"Friends stick together, right?"

Ty Lee grabs the small hand, the cuts and bruises not even bothering to hurt, because all the pain went away when she realized she wasn't alone anymore. And she has never been alone. They can't do it alone, and and they need each other, more they will ever know. A friendship has been engraved into their souls, stabbing the fear and regret until it bleeds like their bloody hands, as they stand side by side.

Thank you, she wants to say, but the face of the enemy is starting to stand to her feet.

Together they run out the door, hand in hand as they never once look back and let the flames of the past scream their names and dance at their feet.

There's beauty, and there's relief, in the silent goodbye they have been waiting for all their lives.

Because we're all poor miserable fools trying to be free, in a world where such a thing doesn't even exist.

a/n: Ty Lee angst, because well, I like angst. If you didn't get it, they were running away from Azula. And yeah, this came to me in five minutes, typed it in ten, and decided it was time to put something up. Hope you like. And also, Ozai's Angel's need some more loving. :D Review, please!

Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: the Last Airbender or any of it's characters.