A/N: This was written for the prompt "I wear a mask" for my atlaland bingo card table. I took the idea of the Blue Spirit being an entity separate of the mask Zuko wears.
Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: the Last Airbender.
Warnings: Hints of Mai/Zuko though, definitely not the focus. Set before the episode, "Return to Omashu."
Spirit of the Mask
By: Nuit Songeur
Omashu.
A boring life, a meaningless existence . But an existence nonetheless. Most of its citizens were within Omashu's walls but there were a small number that managed to escape and organize a resistance. But, even their leader, the infamous master, King Bumi, did not support the efforts but accepted the dismal fate of imprisonment.
Not that Mai cared. She didn't; Mai didn't really care about anything. She didn't feel the excitement as her parents did when the Fire Lord granted her father the city of Omashu when it had been taken. She didn't care for the lavish state room she'd been given or for her little brother that seemed permanently attached to her mother's hip.
Sighing out of boredom was something common that Mai had been doing. Even more so lately when they arrived at Omashu. And out of sheer boredom, Mai sat on the topmost bar of the frame of the architecture that was being constructed around the ancient buildings of Omashu. Beside her was the metal case that contained the old king, dangling dangerously hundreds of feet above the ground. The enormous height didn't seem to frighten him though.
"They say that you're crazy," she said tonelessly, hands cupping her face. He snorted a cackling laugh. "They also say you're a genius."
"That's right," he said. More laughter. "I'm a mad genius."
"Know anything to cure boredom?"
"I know many cures of boredom. Particularly, I recommend the mail carrier system. Makes one nice thrill ride."
"Fascinating. But not what I'm looking for."
"So you don't like thrill for fun? What, then?"
"I don't know. Nothing I suppose. I don't take pleasure in anything." The crazy king thought for a moment.
"How about a mystery?" Mai glanced at him.
"What?"
"There's someone in the city. He just snuck in through the sewer system. But, I don't recognize him— no one I know. But judging by the way he handles himself, I'd say he's going to execute some sort plan tonight." Mai's eyes flickered down at the city below her but the tiny specks that she guessed to be people were indistinguishable to her.
"How can you tell?" The king snorted with laughter, again.
"I have my ways."
That night, Mai noticed it as she anxiously kept glancing out her window. But then, catching herself, she forced her attention away. Still, she couldn't help the eerie feeling of being watched that started after her conversation with the old Omashu king. Once, she saw a small glint, a flash, but when she whipped her head to it, she couldn't see anything.
"Crazy," she told herself. "Paranoid. There's nothing out there. The old man was trying to scare you." But out of that paranoia, Mai didn't remove the holsters that held the multitude of her weapons.
"Mai, you're up late," said her mother when she came to check up on her an hour before midnight.
"I'm fine," Mai said, slightly impatient. "I'm going to bed in a few minutes," she added, ushering her mother out the door. When she was gone, Mai shut her bedroom door and pressed her forehead against the wood paneling.
"Just paranoid," she reminded herself firmly.
But then, her ears perked, picking up a small noise. It sounded like the minute rustle of clothing. Mai whirled around to face the room at the same time the four candles on her dresser blew out, enveloping the room in complete blackness. Mai froze, straining her golden eyes against the room's darkness. Her heart hammered against her chest as she waited apprehensively for her pupils to dilate. Silently, Mai reached for one of her knives concealed within her sleeve. With her hand gripping the hilt of several of them, Mai waited, watching for any sign of movement.
There was another sound: the scraping of metal. Mai turned to her left, where the sound came from, and immediately threw three knives. She was met with the dull thud of the blades embedding in the wall. But the sound wasn't satisfying; she sensed she didn't catch the intruder. Mai kept her back pressed against the wall, not allowing him to sneak up behind her.
"Who's there?" she asked the darkness, reaching inside her dress for her stilettos. There was a soft patter of feet darting across the room. Her eyes blindly followed it. "Whoever you are, you don't scare me." The sound moved to the far corner and started… moving up the walls.
Mai grunted as she threw the sharpened stilettos up in the air. This time, Mai managed to elicit the clinging sound of metal against metal. A resonating ring echoed seconds after initial impact and something fell heavily back on the floor in front of her. Mai crouched, flicking her wrists to release the knives bound to her forearms. She surveyed the room as her eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness. Then finally, her eyes picked up movements.
It was the toe of a black boot and then she saw the black gloved hand whose fingers extended over the hilt of a double Dao sword. Mai rolled across the floor to avoid being struck. But the sword's intention was not to deliver a lethal blow; Mai could have easily missed the blade if it was. But instead, it only reached toward her and, when she rolled, it cut her left sleeve. When she stopped, the billowy sleeve fell from her dress. She watched as her thin, pale arm became exposed in the darkness, the leather thongs that held her weapons now visible.
Suddenly angered by the attack and the ruination of her dress, Mai lunged forward, baring her knives. She saw it as she narrowly missed the intruder by mere inches. The knives she flashed ripped through the dark clothing of the intruder who knocked them from her hand. She collided into the opposite wall with a muffled grunt. Mai scrambled to her feet as fast as she could, ignoring the blunt pain in her shoulder. She reached, with her right hand, to another arrow tucked away within her sash. Before she could reach it though, something knocked against her wrist and she cried out in pain. She held the injured wrist with her left hand, clutching it tightly and flexing her fingers a bit. Fortunately for her, it didn't feel broken.
"Okay, so now you've injured me," Mai said, annoyed. "What is it do you want?"
Suddenly she felt herself being thrown against the wall but trapped against it with one blade-wielding arm. She glanced from the small glint of the sword and then followed the dark path of sleeve to the intruder's face. What she saw made even her narrow eyes widen. It was not a face she had seen before in person but rather one painted on numerous wanted posters plastered all over the Fire Nation.
It was the face of the Blue Spirit.
A grotesque, hideous blue face, baring metal fangs. But then she realized, it wasn't a face. It was a mask. A mask with dark openings for eye holes that she could just almost make out…
Mai's eyebrows slanted.
"What?" she barked at him. "Let me guess, you're some thief in the night that feels you're some sort of hero among peasants? And because of that, you feel empowered enough to take advantage of a teenage girl?" Mai surreptitiously reached into her dress with her good wrist. "Don't think I don't know who you are. Surely you're not dumb enough to walk into Fire Nation territory with your face everywhere on a poster." Mai's words grew more confident as she firmly gripped the handle of her deadly sai.
"You know who I am, just not what you're thinking. You've seen this mask before but not on a poster," said the Spirit. Mai's eyes widened enormously at the sound of the voice, a voice she so easily recognized even though it had been years since she heard it.
"Zu—" A hand quickly covered her mouth.
"Don't say that name," he warned in a low voice. His face dipped closer to her ear, close enough to where her sensitive ears could hear him breathe. "I'm coming for you," he promised.
Mai said nothing. He drew back, removing his arm, and looked at her injury.
"Sorry about your wrist." He turned to leave but Mai called out to him.
"What is this all about? Zuko?" He snapped his body toward her, and Mai noticed his hands clenching into fists.
"I'm not your Zuko," rang Zuko's voice authoritatively. The Spirit quickly jumped to the opened window and looked down at the sleeping city. He made a movement to exit the room but Mai was too quick as she threw the sai, pinning him to the wall.
The Spirit thrashed but her blade was embedded too deeply into the interiors for him to budge. As Mai rushed over, she noticed that, luckily, he had dropped the Dao swords when she ensnared him. She approached the Spirit, cautiously but determinedly, and peered unwavering into the black slits that made up the eyes of the mask. The Spirit froze and stared back. And then, before he could resist, Mai removed the mask.
She screamed, and the mask clattered to the floor. Within seconds, the Spirit snatched up his Dao swords and leaped from the window, disappearing into the night.
Her mother burst into the room a moment later.
"What? What is it?" her mother asked anxiously. Mai took a moment to catch her breath and glanced down at her feet to see the mask still lying on the ground.
"Nothing. I saw a spider," she said without pause, stealthily kicking the mask under her bed. Her mother eyed her warily and reluctantly left the room after realizing she would get no other answer from her daughter. When she was gone, Mai turned to the window and looked out at the dark city, remembering the Spirit's face with a slight cringe.
The voice sounded like Zuko. The movements were like Zuko…
But it was most certainly not Zuko.
I hope you enjoyed! Please review!
-NuitSongeur