Title: The Color Brown
Author: AishiteSubete
Rating: T
Summary: Katara is captured by Earth Kingdom slave traders, and sold to an old enemy. But is this enemy what he seems to be, or is he nothing but a misunderstood hero? [Eventual Zutara.]
Chapter One: Chairo
Brown isn't really her color.
It's not that it doesn't look good on her-no, it's not that at all-but it's that the brown of her dress almost matches the color of her darkened skin, blending in to her complexion, making her uncharacteristic color appear less spectacular than it really is. Despite that, the brown looks good with her cerulean eyes; because brown is the color of her skin, her eyes make her even more of a knockout than her well-shaped facial features and body already do.
After leaving his uncle in Ba Sing Se (not without support, mind you; the old man ran the city's best tea shop), Zuko the banished prince tried his hardest to avoid the war-torn slums and villages on the outskirts of the capital. Those tiny places were nothing but trouble. Substance abuse, slavery, and sex trafficking were all-too-common occurences and Zuko didn't want to be around any of them. But sometimes certain things can't be avoided, and that's how he ended up in the slum of Cha instead.
He kept walking on the main path, hoping to get outside of the village as quickly as he could. He passed a couple of teenagers exchanging opium and heard the sounds of dogfighting in the distance. Blanching, he quickened his pace. All he had to do was remember that he was on his way to capture the Avatar, on his way back to the more luxurious life he lived in the Fire Lord's palace. If he just got out of this dump, he would soon be to freedom...
Then he saw it.
It was a raised platform made of oak wood, a finely-dressed man in a purple yukata standing in front of a whole host of people in brown rags. The people in rags were chained, the shackles on their wrists like leashes tied to wooden pegs in front of them. The smile on the man's face was dirty and greedy as he adressed the crowd of socialites in front of him. He was a slave trader. Zuko's blood boiled dangerously; he hated slave traders. They violently plucked people out of their daily lives, and sold them to people who would treat them no better than animals. He watched, his eyes narrowed, as a small boy was led to the front of the platform, his eyes red and swollen from crying. "I want six-hundred thousand gold pieces for this one," he said in a boisterous voice that reeked of conceit. A slim woman in a pink furisode raised her hand in the air. "I've got six-hundred thousand gold pieces! Going once, going twice..." Silence. "Sold! To the lovely lady in pink." Holding a hefty burlap sack in her hand, the woman walked to the platform and handed it to the trader, leading the small boy out.
The trader looked behind him, and grabbed a chain from a peg, jerking on it roughly. A teenage girl lurched forward, almost falling to the ground, but regaining her balance in time to stand arrogantly at the edge of the platform, her cerulean eyes narrowed at the trader angrily. If it weren't for the brown rag dress that blended into her complexion, the girl would have looked exotic. Purpling bruises littered her eyes and jaws, trailing down her neck and arms; the trader had beaten her, clearly. That in itself made Zuko angry.
"This is a fine specimen we have here," the trader said proudly as Zuko watched the girl's eyes scan the crowd. She looked from the crowd on her right and slowly looked across the group until she reached his side-the left. In a split second, the two had made eye contact; the girl look horrified, appalled, as if she knew him. He, however, did find her vaguely familiar. "She is sixteen years of age," the trader continued, "and very healthy. She has no medical issues. She is a unique one; a waterbender." Zuko's eyebrows shot up; he knew this girl! It was the Avatar's woman! "The price for this one would normally be at one and a half million gold pieces, but since she's such a disrespectful rebel-" he pulled on her chain to accent his words, and she shuffled forward clumsily. "-the price has been knocked down to one million gold pieces. One million gold pieces for the waterbender! Any takers, any takers..."
A woman raised her hand for one million; a man soon raised his hand for one and a half million; a couple wagered together for three million; a large, old man raised his hand for five million. "I've got five million gold pieces...going once, going twice..."
"Ten million."
The crowd of socialites turned to look at him, and Zuko never realized that he had spoken until the trader said, "Ten million. Going once, twice, sold to the man with the scar." The banished prince stood, dumbfounded for a second, before he walked up to the platform where Katara was trying to wrench herself away from the iron grip of the chains. He grabbed Katara's hand, hoping to speak to her with his eyes. I won't hurt you; I'm saving you.
"Ahem." Zuko turned to face the trader. "The ten million pieces?" Zuko's smirk was decidedly wicked as he held out his hand towards the trader's face.
"I never had ten million pieces." The fire that engulfed the trader was vibrant and deadly, but it was Katara's scream that triggered the crowd into a frenzy. They scattered in every direction, praying that they wouldn't be the next ones to meet their ends by the hands of Zuko's fire. The banished prince turned to watch as many of the socialites ran from the scene and as some benders stood their ground to challenge him to a fight.
The Earthbenders in front of him stood in a tight-knit group, planning to attack him as a unit if he charged at them. But Zuko was smart enough to understand their idea just from their stance, and was smart enough that the quickest way to destroy them was to do it at once-instantaneously and unexpectedly. So he turned, facing the stunned-silent Katara, and grabbed both of her hands. "We're getting out of here." Then he glanced back at the small fleet of Earthbenders (all of whom were confused, waiting for the next attack), and his amber eyes ingited a blaze that swallowed them whole, leaving nothing but bones in its wake.
With a smirk, Zuko undid the chains that bound Katara to the wooden platform, holding her tightly so she wouldn't be able to waterbend against him. He took off in a run, the South Pole girl following behind him. They ran down the main path-the quickest way out-and escaped Cha about ten minutes before anyone arrived at the scene of the slave trade to see what had happened. They had escaped conviction, and were now on the run together from Ba Sing Se authorities.
Zuko had aniticpated a lot of things when he set out to search for the Avatar. He had expected it to be an easy job, had expected to come home shortly with much notoriety and fame. Years later, he discovered that it wasn't all he had dreamed. He had chased down a twelve-year-old kid and his gang, fled to Ba Sing Se like a refugee after he tried to thwart the plots of others to capture the Avatar, and now he's on the run as a criminal-as a murder-all because he decided to save the Avatar's girlfriend.
As he dashed through the forest, Katara's mouthy complaints of "what the hell?" registering in his mind like colorful, poignant punctuation marks, he realized that searching for the Avatar alone was going to be just like the rest of his life since his banishment-nothing like he anticipated.
