Uncle
Iroh: (breaks up fight between Zuko and Pirate Captain) Are you
so busy fighting, you cannot see that your own ship has set sail!
Prince Zuko: This is no time for one of your proverbs,
Uncle!
Uncle Iroh: It is no proverb! (points to ship
sailing down the river)
Pirate captain: Bleeding Hog-Monkeys, (take off after his ship.)
Prince Zuko: HA Ha HA!
Points and laughs as the pirate captain runs after his ship.
Pirate crew sail by in Zuko's boat, jeering. One of them moons him,
Prince Zuko: Hey, That's my ship! (Takes off running after his ship,)
Uncle Iroh: Maybe it should be a proverb..
Prince Zuko: C'mon Uncle.
That was the best qoute in the first season. In my humble oppinion, but it also got me thinking. When is the best time for proverbs? So I decided that this would be a good theme for stories,.
Plus on a sidenote I want to point out that this is the only time that Zuko laughs in season one, (has anyone else noticed this!) He laughed, really laughed! Hopefully we will see the Prince laugh in this Friday's episode. Or atlease smile.
So then, I am writing this little fanfic and it may be a series if this turns out alright, or else it might just be a stand alone fic.
A Time for Proverbs
"Uncle," said a voice strugging not to crack "Don't go. Please." The voice begged. It was prince Zuko, sitting on the side of his Uncle Irohs, The Dragon of the West, The Great general and hero of the Fire Naitons bed-side. He held his head low, and absently fingered the wooden toy in his hands.
"But, I have to, Prince Zuko." The elder bender responded. "But, I will not be gone long. Only a few weeks. Exactly three weeks. I promise." The Old retired general responded placing a supports hand on the boys shoulder. Zuko slouched as if he didn't even have a spind to support himself.
"But," He started again. "No buts, Prince Zuko." Uncle Iroh returned to his task of packing his clothes. He could've had servants do it, and they would have done a very proficient jonb of it and it would've been done in less than the hour it had already taken him. But he'd opted to do it himself. He was more than fifty years old. He'd fought, survived and saved dozens in seven of the nine great battles of the Ozai era, he could pack twenty one identical royal robes and the few extras that went with each one to make the ceremonial. "I must leave Prince Zuko." He said firmly. "But," He said softly "I will return before you know it." He grinned his wide Grin that Zuko thought made him look like a humorous squirrel chimp.
"How can you leave and return without my knowing it? I cant help but notice that your packing, making travel arrangements, and leaving!" Zuko shouted. He didn't want to be home in the capitol, with Azula for the long winter break that all the other students of the Royal Fire Academy for Boys were sure to be enjoying.
He'd been slightly relieved to hear that his father was leaving on the annual trip to some island where he'd do secret firebending stuff and stay with the Fire Sages of the temple. But to have his Uncle called away also to some far away port in the Earth kingdom aswell! It was horrible.
With out his uncle everything would be long, hard and depressing. He'd have to share Azula's firebending instructors. He'd have nowhere to run to avoid her. He'd share every meal, every activity, every drill, and lesson with her. He wouldn't be able to vanish for a few hours with out her cruel threats and jokes. He'd be miserable!
He'd tried to express this to his Uncle but it was embarrasing to say that he was…well, scared to be alone with his younger sister. But he'd swallowed his pride in a panic and said so, That Azula would have no one to bother but him!
"I am sorry, nephew. But maybe you could try finding something to do to occupy your time. I am sure that Azula will also be busy." Uncle said, realizing that Zuko had no escape and feeling guilty that he was leaving him to fend for himself for so long. But it couldn't be helped.
"Zuko there is an old saying." He began, Zuko sighed heavily but was to depressed to tell his uncle just how uninterested he was in old sayings. "If you do not like something you should change it," He began in his sagely voice.
"Change it! How! I have to eat, I have to study, and drill and live! I cant avoid her if I have to share in all her activities. And at the end of the day, then what!" Zuko shouted, feeling nearer to tears than he had been in the four years that had passed since he was seven.
Uncle Iroh cleared his throat. "I wasn't finished." He huffed impaitiently. "If you cant change it, change your attitude towards it." Iroh finished in his sagely voice that he always used when passing on knowledge, though the indignant expression showed how upset he was at having his wise recitations distrubed for the fifth time that day.
"People dont value wisdom anymore. That's why the world is now plagued with all these ill-tempered fools!" He muttered as he turned to finish packing his bag.
Zuko was quiet for several moments as he contemplated what his uncle was saying. Maybe Uncle wanted him to see what was obvious to the elder firebender but hidden to him.If he calmed himself and thought about it…Aha!
He had it. Uncle wanted him to change having to stay in the Palace with Azula, so then…
"Uncle, do you think…that…well…maybe, just maybe…that…uh, um well, I might, I mean…some how that…" Iroh sighed as he realized his Nephew reached the wrong conclusion. "I could…come?" Zuko finished in a small hopeful voice, smiling weakly and trying to imitate the pleading face Azula sometimes used to get her way about major things with their father…
Maybe, Zuko thought bitterly as he lay across his bed that evening, In his old age Uncle is losing his sight. That was a perfect copy of the face that Azula had used more than once on the fire-lord himself! His Uncle had to be blind not to cave and to tell him, and so firmly. "No."
Zuko sighed. It looked like he was stuck with Azula and himself in the palace with no one to stop them from bickering. How Ironic. He thought we will be in the company and care of several people, more than a hundred! Yet, there is no one of high enough authority that can help me. Zuko had a strange thought.
Of all the adult servants and elderly nurse-maids that looked after him. He was eleven and could boss them around, tell them what to do and they'd do it. He could even have them thrown in jail, and if he wanted to, he was sure that he could have one or two people executed if he pulled the right strings with his father. He had a great power over them.
He wasn't required to say the pleases and thank-you's that he'd always said. He wasn't required to thank them or be grateful to them. But even if he wasn't exactly grateful to them, it was a habit that he'd gotten from his mother when he was young and one he'd kept when he saw how his uncle had the same habit, of thanking the servants that, well…served him.
Zuko didn't ponder on this for long because just as he wanted to delve into this thought his door opened and his sister strode in. "Hey!" He began to protest, she put a hand and he stopped. "Don't worry, Zuzu-' "Don't call me that!" He exclaimed, contining as though he hadn't spoken she said; "I am not here to make fun of you, but simply to ask a single question well," She smiled softly as though embarassed. "actually…I need a little help." She muttered.
Zuko was suspicous, but she was just a kid like him, he thought for a moment. With out any one around to impress maybe she could behave like she had when they were really young. Before she realized that she was "special" and that she held their fathers affection. Like a little sister who can be bratty while keeping her demons under control, like the rest of the human race.
"Okay, Zula, what do you need?" He said simply, no malice or edge in his voice, only the slightest apprehension in his chest. "Well, its math. You're pretty good, right?" She asked, the childish innocence that most nine and a half year old mustered when feeling embarassed.
Zuko was good with numbers. Adding, Subtract, Multiplying and Dividing he'd quickly mastered the principles of them as a child. He was now on a higher lever or arithmetic, one with equations and problems with out numbers in them.
"Yeah sure. I can help. Is it written work or just mental figuring?" He asked, sighing releif, a small smile threating to part the clouds of gloom hovering around his face. "Mental," She responded with a like smile. "I was just wondering, what is the total if you multiply ninety by three and add seven times twenty one?" Zuko thought for a moment.
He saw the problem as all numbers in his head- 90x3+7x21, which was really just 270+147, the answer ofcourse was 417. In less than half a moment he had figured his answer and double checked it, "Oh, I am good." He thought smugly, but simply replied.
"Four hundred seventeen." "You sure about that?" Azula asked her mouth was gaping incredulously. He nodded. "Yeah, sure I'm sure." Azula grinned almost deviosly. "Why did you ask?" he asked against his better judgement.
"Oh well, we have the winter months off." She said smirking now, Zuko nodded not sure where she was going with this but certain he wouldn't like it. "Three months of winter, each one is thirty days, right?" She went on. Again he nodded affirmatively. "Right. And so we'll drill and spar everyday to keep our skills honed. We face off in three-round matches. Which I, with my superior skill, will ALWAYS win, plus when I put the extra whippings on you while we share my instructors for the twenty one days-or three weeks, which ever you prefer-that Uncle Iroh, your own personal instructor is gone then I figured that, like today I'll probably beat you in seven rounds daily, thus when we return to our respective schooling at the Royal Academy's I dont want my numbers wrong when I tell all the girls how well I pummeled you." She bowed mockingly.
"Good luck, brother." She sneered as he growled in frustration. "Bequiet! Get out!" He shouted, throwing a small square pillow at her head. Whether it was his frustrated fury of her own manipulation-he wasn't sure but the pillow burst into flames as it neared his target. He hoped against hope that she would be burned. He knew she' wouldn't be hurt and the swelling would go down in no time. He knew that if it burned so much as his sisters hair, that he would ennvoke the wrath of his father upon him as soon as the fire lord returned. But in his fury, He dind't care .
"You'll need it." She said, obviously unperturbed by the flaming cushion soaring at great speed toward her head. She turned with a single motion to defend herself, and the pillow exploded into a puff of ashes that settled to the floor where the Princess had stood. With that the click of his door closing resounded throught out the room.
Zuko sunk miserably back onto his bed. What am I going to do? Then it hit him. "If you do not like something change it. If you can not change it, then change your attitude about it." Zuko was struck with an interpretation to those words like he was a metal rod in a lightning storm.
Whoa! First chapter and guess what? This is the one hundredth Zuko and Iroh story. Don't believe me, go to the main page for ATLA fics and put in Zuko and Iroh for your characters. On the day that I posted this there were ninety nine stories (Many of them terrific!) and four pages of stories. SO I am posting this story to be the one hundredth story to fill up those pages and force the page count to spill over to five and then continue and grow to 10, 20 and fill many slots with all the great stories that are born in the imaginations of the A:TLA fans!
Thanks for reading.
