Like Glass
Summary: She isn't insane. She isn't. She is Azula. She is as close to perfect as anyone can hope to be. She might be broken (just a bit), but never insane. And things that are broken can be put back together again.
Pairings: None.
Warnings: Insane!Bloodthirsty!Azula imagining several people's murders. Azula's mind is indeed a scary place to be.
Zuko is visiting her.
He's talking, but Azula isn't listening. He never has anything worthwhile to say. Never speaks the truth.
The truth is, she's in the cell and he's not. She's been reduced to this pathetic state and he hasn't. He's never said that, but she knows that he's thinking it.
She lets her eyes wander the length of his body. She can tell many things about him from his appearance. His clothes are fine and elegant, speaking of a life of luxury, a life filled with riches.
(Not actually speaking, of course. She isn't insane. She knows that clothes can't talk. Although, that is an interesting thought. She wonders what they would say if they could talk – Azula pushes that thought from her mind. Now is notthe time. Perhaps later.)
Zuko is talking more now and even making a few hand gestures. Azula's eyes are drawn of their own accord to the Fire Headpiece in his top-knot. So he's still the Firelord, huh? Too bad. She had been hoping that he had been overthrown. Someone should have assassinated him by now. Oh well, she thinks happily, at least she'll have the pleasure of killing him herself.
She takes a moment to indulge in that pleasant thought. How intoxicating, to be the one to finally end his miserable life. It's long overdue; his life should have been snuffed out years ago. But she won't be able to burn him to a crisp like he deserves, since the Avatar has taken away her Firebending.
Don't think about that! She doesn't need to be thinking about the hole in her chest, the empty vortex of nothingness that has taken the place of her Firebending.
His eyes sharpen and his lips move. He's finally noticed that she's not listening. He's probably telling her to pay attention to him. Please. Little Zuzu can be as demanding as he wants, but she isn't going to indulge him in his ridiculous idea that he has power over her.
She tries to ignore the panic she feels when she realizes that she really can't hear him. He's talking, she can see his lips move, but she can't hear the words. She pushes that annoying emotion down.
After all, what does it matter if everything sounds muted? It doesn't mean that she's crazy, rather, that she's choosing to block out the meaningless drivel that he brother usually spews out. They're just words, useless, jumbled words.
Yes, she's calm now. There's nothing wrong with her. There's never anything wrong with her. She's the good girl. Well, not good in the conventional sense, because she doubts that many people would call her good. But she's always been the perfect Fire Nation princess, the prodigy, the favored child.
Absently, she notices that Zuko is gone. She is alone in her cell once again. She wonders when he had left, then dismisses the question as unimportant. Her brother's comings and goings mean nothing to her, because he is nothing.
Azula slides down into a sitting position and stares up at the ceiling. The room she's in isn't a traditional prison cell; it's completely white and there is padding on the walls and floor. She's in a mental hospital. A crazy house.
But she has fooled them. She's fooled them all. Because they think that she's lost all her reason. They think that just because she's not calm and collected, she's not in control.
She's very much in control.
They underestimate her. They believe that all rational thought has left her, that she spends all of her time alternating between staring blankly at the wall and screaming incoherently. However, underneath her guise, she's still the same calculating princess. She's perfectly sane.
Sometimes she forgets that it's just a façade. But it doesn't matter if, at times, the appearance becomes the reality. She doesn't pay any mind to the days when she loses herself in the pretense of insanity. The days that she spends screaming until her throat is raw, scratching at the door with bloodied fingers. Everyone needs to let their emotions out every once in a while. It's healthy. Therapeutic.
She drags her thoughts away from the topic of her sanity. She isn't sure of how long she has been laying there, thinking about nothing, but slowly she becomes aware that her thoughts have taken a turn.
They're always doing that. Turning round and round, spinning faster and faster and faster until everything is blurred and fuzzy and wonderfully mixed up. But she's not thinking about her whirly-swirly thoughts right now. She's thinking about her Zuzu and his visits. That hadn't been the first time that he had visited her.
One, two, three.
Three times, he had come.
Three times, he had lowered himself down from his pedestal to her filthy little cell. Three times, that little Zuzu had made time in his busy schedule to see his crazy sister and shouldn't she feel so privileged that the Fire Lord had deigned to remember her?
Three is a good number, Azula decides. A nice, firm number. Four isn't. Four is Death. Everyone knows that. That's why their family had fallen apart. Because there had been four.
Father, mother, son, daughter.
Brother and sister.
There had been four members of the family, and it isn't Azula's fault that she had come last. The outsider. Fourth.
Really, it's That Woman's fault. Calling herself their mother, trying to break up their family. Azula had always known. She had seen the way That Woman favored Zuko, tried to turn him against her.
She had been lying to Father too. Always whispering sweet poison in his ears. Snake.
Azula doesn't like to think about snakes. Thinking about them will make them appear. The guards call her delusional, but the snakes are real. They slither on the floor and the walls, sometimes wind their way around her body, squeezing and crushing. Whenever she starts screaming and gasping for air, as is rational, they would laugh.
The guards had laughed with them. Not out loud, certainly not, but Azula knows that they're laughing in their minds. She knows.
Once, Azula would have killed them for mocking her, but she contents herself with knowing that one day, the snakes will get them. She likes to imagine that they will wrap around their necks and wring the life out of them.
It will be most satisfying to see her former tormentors falling to their knees, suffocating as they bow before their Princess, the rightful ruler.
Because she is the rightful ruler, no matter what the rest of the Fire Nation thinks. And Zuko can wear that shiny piece of metal in his hair for as long as he wants. It doesn't mean anything. The Pheonix King is going to defeat him and rescue her from this vile place.
She had said as much to Zuko, the first time he had come, and he had given her this look. And what she had seen in his gaze had made her furious.
Pity.
He pities her. Like she cares what he thinks.
But it isn't pity. She knows why he really visits her. He comes here to mock her. Point and laugh at the little hog-monkey in her cage. Stand and stare. Look all you want, but please don't feed her.
She can't tell if it is day or night anymore. This white little cell doesn't have a window. The only way she knows that time has passed is her hair. It flows down her back, past her waist now.
She has never let the people who work here cut her hair. Azula knows that they can easily drug her, and then cut it off when she sleeps, but they don't. She suspects that a portion of their heart is still loyal to their princess. They are fortunate. When she gets free, she will not spare them, but she will kill them quickly. They will die painlessly, with the knowledge that that their merciful princess has recognized their hidden faithfulness.
She leans forwards, letting her hair fall into her face. It is greasy and stringy, but it is long and there are few tangles in it.
Oh, please. It's a grimy, matted mess and we should have chopped it off years ago.
The voice is back. It says that it is her, but Azula knows that there is only one of her, no matter what the voice insists.
I am you. We're the same.
Oh, shut up.
Make me! The childish response has Azula grinding her teeth, but she quickly catches herself and takes a deep breath instead. She is not going to have an argument with a voice in her head. She isn't insane.
A snicker echoes through her head. Then how do you explain me?
You're not real.
And yet, you're talking to me.
Enough! She exorcises her iron will, and forces the voice away, into the depths of her mind. It isn't gone permanently; Azula knows that sooner or later – probably sooner – it will surface from the recesses of her mind again. But for now, she has a few minutes of quiet.
A few minutes to think about her family. It would have been just perfect without That Woman. Then they would be three again. Or maybe Zuko was the one who shouldn't have existed. After all, Zuko doesn't seem to think that family mattered. He thinks that friendship is more important than blood ties. Traitor.
Zuko and That Woman. Both of them will be gone, erased, and Father and Daughter can be together in a happy family.
But Daddy isn't very nice either. He can go too.
A family of one. Azula can live with that. Because ultimately, there is only one person she can trust. Herself. Everyone else is a filthy liar. They say that they are your friends, but you can't turn your back to them. If you do, they will try to throw a knife at you, or block your chi. Rotten to the core, all of them.
Then again, sometimes she can't even rely on herself, as the voice loves to remind her.
She pauses, and reruns that last thought through her mind. What is she thinking? Of course she can depend on herself! She is a true princess! She is charming and beautiful, graceful and delicate. And when she gets out of here, she is going to gut Zuko and set his innards on fire.
She giggles quietly. That is such an amusing image.
She can't Firebend anymore – she ignores the sharp pang that stabs through her heart at that thought – but this is the Fire Nation. There's no shortage of fire here.
She'll find a fire source, then she'll drag little Zuzu – forcefully, if need be (actually, she'd prefer it if he resisted her because that will give her a reason to hurt him more. Then again, does she really need a reason?) – to it. She'll slice open his torso with his own Headpiece and watch the blood spill out.
Red, red, blood, spurting out and staining the ground black. Then she'll set him on fire. And maybe she'll round up those other traitors too. They'll all be bleeding and burning and screaming and she'll take the bloodstained Headpiece and place it on her own head. She'll be the ruler and they'll be dead.
Head. Dead. She is a poet.
She is snapped out of her thoughts by a familiar voice. "Azula, you know I love you, right?"
She doesn't even glance to the side. She knows what she will see. That Woman will be standing there, the one that likes to pretend to be her mother.
"Azula? Sweetie?"
Azula twitches, but doesn't break her stare from the wall. Azula knows from experience that if she ignores her long enough, That Woman will go away. Lazily, she stares at the roof. It's white, just like everything else in this Agni-forsaken room.
My, what unladylike language, the voice murmurs. Azula lets her lip curl in a snarl, but the voice doesn't say anything else.
"Azula? Azula! I love you!" Maybe before, Azula would have shed a tear or two at hearing those words, but she's over it by now. She really is.
"Honey, why won't you look at me? Why?" Her voice is already starting to fade. Azula closes her eyes, waiting until she can no longer hear that sad voice. When she opens them, she turns and looks at the wall. There's no one there. She smirks in satisfaction. She had been right. Again.
She stretches out onto the floor, ignoring the dirt that clings to her dress. What a horrid brother Zuzu is. He doesn't even get someone to clean this little cell.
He did, but you keep making it so difficult for them to clean.
Azula scoffs. I don't know what you're talking about.
Please. If you hadn't thrown your temper tantrums every time someone tried to clean up –
Temper tantrums?
Would you prefer I call them mental breakdowns? The voice is quietly teasing, but the words make Azula feel like she's been doused in ice water.
She doesn't have breakdowns, she doesn't. Doesn't, doesn't, doesn't, doesn't –
Oh, that's real convincing.
Shut up.
You have well and truly cracked. You're a lunatic. We're a lunatic.
Shut up.
Why did we have to be crazy? There was so much we could have done with our life! So much we could have achieved!
Shut up, shut up, shut up!
The voice ignores her and continues its rant. We had so much potential; why'd we have to be a psychopath?
"Shut up!" she screams. "There's no we, there's just me! I'm not crazy! Just shut up and leave me alone!"
Azula stops yelling and waits. She realizes that at some point, she had gotten up. Now she is standing in the middle of her cell, her fists clenched. Her breath sounds harsh in the ringing silence. Good. The voice has left again. She settles back down, leaning against the wall.
If anyone had witnessed that, they surely would have come to the conclusion that she is crazy. Deranged. Mad.
She isn't insane. She isn't. She is Azula. She is as close to perfect as anyone can hope to be. She might be broken (just a bit), but never insane. And things that are broken can be put back together again.
A/N: Aw, poor Azula. You gotta feel at least a bit sorry for her. I know I do, and I wrote this depressing, slightly disturbing thing.
So, how did I do? Do you think that I sufficiently captured Azula's insanity? Please review and give me your opinion.