Turn the Page
By
Ian Gainsborough
Author's Note: I know, I know, "Ian! What are you doing?! Shouldn't you be working on Long Way From Here instead of writing up another story? What's the deal!?" Truth is, I had a lot of thought in this concept, and I needed to get on it while I still have the ideas, otherwise I'll never get around to it, it rots, and then some other writer comes up with the same concept and totally murders it! Screw that!
Chapter 1
Zuko drifted weightlessly through the pitch-black void. He had no determination of ground or sky, and felt distant from his body. He looked around, and all around he saw nothing. He felt nothing, save for the feeling of his skin crawling across his body. It felt unnatural. He peered around, wishing for something—anything—to give him a sign of what to do.
The void dissolved to his reflection in the mirror, his face unmarred by any burning scar that only hurt when he touched it. His face was as it was those years before his home became the sea and the ground he wandered for so long. Zuko's lips parted and bent a smile, his teeth gleaming white as the moon. His golden eyes squinted with the smile he told himself to never show to anyone. He closed his eyes as tears fell down both his cheeks; it felt strange, only feeling tears down his right cheek, but never his left. He closed his eyes, only briefly.
When he opened them, his reflection was replaced with the Avatar, the broad, goofy grin of the little Air bender that had eluded him for so long: so close and in his grasp, but never there to settle his heart and almost always turning his satisfaction into rage and frustration. He punched through the mirror, shattering the pieces that made up Aang's face, only to realize before him his Uncle stood there. Iroh caught the punch, and Zuko was head over heels and on his back the next moment. He looked up at Iroh, then at Azula, then to Father, then to Mai, and then at his younger child self.
"His story has come to an end," said Zuko's child-self.
"Or so he thinks," said Iroh.
"He doesn't really know what to do now, does he?" said Mai plainly.
"Perhaps all he has to do is turn the page," said Iroh. Zuko's lips moved, but no words left them. The images of Iroh, Father, Azula and Mai disintegrated, but Zuko's eyes remained locked on the smiling child that he once was, and the words, "Turn the page" echoed through his mind.