Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Avatar: The Last Airbender, Legend of Korra, or anything else that may be considered the intellectual property of Michael DiMartino or Bryan Konietzko.
Chapter 1
Lieutenant Lee sat at a desk in his cramped stateroom. Strewn across the bland steel surface before him were a dozen reports on as many maintenance projects taking place throughout the ship. None of the repairs could be considered especially urgent, but it was his duty as the First Lieutenant to oversee the material condition of the ship. Although he would never admit it, he hated that aspect of the job. He rubbed his temples in exhaustion as he finished reading over a request for authorization to work on the main boiler before signing it. He melted the wax in a small bowl on his desk with a quick burst of firebending from his palm before stamping the request with the seal found on the ring he always wore.
He rolled the document up with a heavy sigh before placing it with half a dozen others in his outgoing documents box. A yeoman would be by later to pick them up and distribute them back to their originating departments. As he reached for another request, this one from the navigation department, he heard footsteps approaching his doorway. He looked up to see one of the ship's firebenders standing there. A frown threatened to cross his face, but long years of discipline and training kept his expression neutral. Lee had no problem with the man himself. It was the uniform he hated. The skull mask that hid the man's face from view was disconcerting, although he knew that was the exact intent.
"What can I help you with?" he asked.
"First Lieutenant, sir, the captain requests your presence on the bridge," the soldier replied, his voice echoing hollowly behind the metal face mask.
"Very well soldier. I suppose you were sent down to escort me to the bridge?"
"Yes sir."
"All right. Give me a minute."
Lee stood up slowly, several joints popping as he did so. He smoothed the wrinkles out of his uniform as he stepped away from his chair, stopping briefly near the door to look himself over in the mirror. His was young for such a high ranking officer on board a ship, but he still had hair that was starting to grow premature gray streaks. He was handsome in a rugged sort of way, with a pair of blue eyes instead of the usual golden color of Fire Nation citizens.
"Lead on soldier," he said as he stepped through the watertight door that led into his room, closing it behind him. The soldier turned and started walking through the bleak corridor without another word towards him. Lee silently wondered what it could be that the captain needed from him. While he welcomed the break from the tedium of reviewing the maintenance plans, whatever the old man needed couldn't be a good thing. They typically met once a day at their morning meeting, where Lee would give the captain a briefing on the current condition of the ship.
As they made their way through the maze like interior of his ship, Lee took note of all the leaky pipes, fatigued bulkheads, and any other issues with the integrity of the ship. The Azulon had been built almost thirty years before, and was rapidly beginning to show its age. Thanks to the fact that the vessel was maintained by the War Ministry and not the Fire Navy, there wasn't much of a budget to take her to the yards. While the ship's weapon systems and other pieces of experimental technology were perfectly maintained, the rest of the vessel was slowly beginning to come apart, and there was only so much that he could do to keep it in war fighting condition.
After the lengthy climb up the ladder that ran straight up the middle of the command tower, Lee and his talkative escort arrived on the bridge. A dozen sailors stood at various stations, including one man Lee recognized as the ship's navigator. The captain was standing in his customary place, leaning up against the chart table, looking over the course that they had plotted out.
"First Lieutenant's on the Conn," one of the younger sailors shouted out as soon as he noticed Lee's presence.
"Carry on," the captain said, turning around to face his second in command.
"Captain, sir, good afternoon," Lee said, giving the older man before him the Fire Nation salute. The Captain returned the gesture and beckoned for Lee to follow him towards the door that led out onto the observation platform. The wind outside was warm, carrying with it a hint of sulfur that signaled the approach of the home islands. Lee closed the door behind him before turning to join the captain at the rail.
"What do you need, sir?" he asked, unsure of how to proceed otherwise.
"Conversation, Lieutenant," the captain replied, his voice as calm as it always was, "Counsel, if you prefer. The duty of the First Lieutenant has always been to advise their captain on matters pertaining to the safe operation of the ship. While the Navy has certainly strayed away from that in recent years, what with the onset of the glory seeking officers that my late brother seems to have sparked, it has always been so."
Lee nodded in silence. While it wasn't common knowledge, Captain Yuan was the younger brother of the late Admiral Zhao. The two men shared almost nothing in common, however. Where Zhao had been reckless, often leaping before he looked, Yuan was slow and methodical, cautious in his planning and meticulous in his tactical processes.
"Do you know what we left North Island for, Lieutenant?"
"Yes sir."
The Azulon had left its homeport of North Island, a Fire Nation colony in Earth Kingdom waters but not directly on the mainland itself, on the orders of Fire Lord Zuko himself. As the ranking Fire Navy officer, in charge of the tiny force of outdated ships that protected the waters of the North Sea Islands, Yuan had been called back to the Fire Nation to discuss plans to dismantle the colony and return the citizens to the home islands. The colony itself hadn't been intended to "spread Fire Nation culture to the rest of the world," as popular propaganda had been so fond of stating of the rest of the colonies. Its purpose had been much more secret than that.
Situated in a strange body of water known as the Burning Sea, the six islands in the North Sea chain had been identified by the War Ministry in the time of Fire Lord Sozin as an ideal location to develop and test top secret military projects. The research facility at North Island had been established shortly after the genocide of the Air Nomads, and for nearly a hundred years had cranked out innovations from improved boilers for the Fire Navy cruisers, to the feared tundra tanks, to their most recent projects, the airships and the experimental armament that Azulon carried.
Lee looked down at the main deck of his ship. Azulon was an Empire Class battleship, one of the leading ships of the feared class. She had been relegated to control of the War Ministry five years before, to be taken to the North Island complex for retrofitting. All of her trebuchets had been removed, replaced with a variety of experimental weapons for testing. Her most recent configuration was her most fearsome yet. In a neat row on the centerline, three cannons had been installed. Lee had heard of similar weapons being mounted to a select few airships, but the ones on his own vessel were much larger and heavier. War Minister Qin, before his mysterious disappearance after what had become known as the "drill incident," had called the weapons the future of naval armament.
A few crewmen bustled about the weapons now, cleaning them or applying a coat of oil to preserve them as well as they could against the elements. One man was even polishing the ornate golden dragon's head that adorned one of the guns.
"We've been recalled to consult with Fire Lord Zuko about the dismantling of the North Island colony and military research facility," the captain said, pulling Lee back to the situation at hand, "But we also have another reason for going."
"Another reason, sir?"
"Yes. The Five Island Council has given me an important document to deliver to the Fire Lord. It seems that they didn't entrust it to the care of a messenger hawk."
Curiosity momentarily got the best of Lee.
"Do you know what the document contains, sir?"
"I don't, Lieutenant. It's sealed, so I can't exactly find out either. I'm not sure what we've gotten ourselves into here, but my gut is telling me that it can't be a good thing. But that isn't what I've called you up here to talk about."
"It's not?"
Yuan turned to face Lee. The older man's hair was streaked with gray, his face starting to wrinkle in places. His eyes still held a certain brightness, though, a warmth not commonly found amongst Fire Navy officers.
"I've read your file, Lieutenant. You're from the North Island colony, correct?"
"Yes sir. I grew up near the shipyard where they retrofitted the cruisers."
"A strange thing for a colonist to rise to such a high station as an officer."
"Some would say so, yes sir."
As much as he hated it, Lee knew that the captain was speaking the truth. Colonists were considered lesser citizens under the rule of Fire Lord Ozai. While North Island had an officer academy, it was not as widely respected as the Royal Fire Navy academy in the Capital City. Most graduates would go on to serve as non-commissioned officers in the army or serve as officers in the Colony Defense Force, the colony version of the Home Guard. Lee, however, had chosen to go for a career as an officer in the Fire Navy, a course of action that had drawn much ridicule from his instructors at the academy. All his career, he had been told that he wouldn't ever amount to anything as a colonist, that he would never achieve the higher ranks and the command that he wanted so badly.
"I mean you no disrespect, Lieutenant. I have come to admire you over the time you've served under me, more so than I have admired most higher ranking officers that didn't have what most perceive as your disadvantage. I know that you have great potential, and that one day you will make a wonderful commanding officer, and perhaps even a great admiral or commander."
"Thank you, sir."
"I must admit, when I first took over command of this vessel, I didn't understand colonists. I had never understood how you could be so patriotic, but at the same time be so proud of the individual culture that you had established that sets you apart from the citizens of the home islands. Citizens, especially noble born ones, are raised to believe that all colonists are inferior to those who had never lived beyond our borders. I admit with shame that I was once one of those men.
"When my brother was defeated and killed at the North Pole, he brought great shame and dishonor upon my family. Since that time, I have come to see the colony on North Island as more of a home to me than the home islands ever were. Colonists have a simple dignity, an equality brought about by sharing the same struggles and hardships. North Island, I've noticed, doesn't have any clear separation of classes that occurs so often in the Fire Nation."
The Captain trailed off, turning to face towards the sea once again. Lee stood silently by, wondering what the man could possibly be trying to get to.
"Do you love your home, Lieutenant?"
"Yes sir. I can't see myself living anywhere other than North Island."
"So would I be correct in assuming that you do not support the Harmony Restoration movement?"
"Yes sir."
"But don't you think it's wrong for Fire Nation citizens to occupy Earth Kingdom lands?"
Lee almost responded, but stopped to think. He had never wondered whether his home was an affront to the world before. He had grown up in the same building as a few Earth Kingdom families and even a family from the Southern Water Tribe. They had all gotten along superbly, despite differing views on the war.
"No sir," he finally said, "Maybe it was at first, but we have all learned to coexist since then."
"You were hesitant to answer, Lieutenant. I understand, it is a hard question to answer if it has never been asked before. But I encourage you, never give up that belief. Many of your brothers and sisters, your fellow colonists, feel the same way. If the rumors I've heard are true, that very spirit just might allow you to keep your home."
The captain turned to face Lee once again.
"Are you busy, Lieutenant?"
"Yes sir. I have a ton of requests to review still."
"Ah, the workload of the First. I remember it well from when I was at your level in the Navy. Keep at it, Lieutenant. Some day you'll get away from it, probably sooner than you might think. You're dismissed."