A/N: So, this will be in three parts! Enjoy and review if you feel so inclined!

"Oh, that way madness lies; let me shun that."
- William Shakespeare, King Lear, 3.4.21

My name? Don't you already know it? Yes, but you just wanted to make sure? Well, that's a waste. You know who I am as well as I do.

You didn't come all the way out here just to hear about me, though.

Oh, you did? That's new… someone…caring about me.

But that's not important. You've heard the stories. Rumors. I'm the deranged Fire princess, right? Betrayed by her only friends, defeated by the courageous waterbender Katara and her own brother, the glorious new Firelord?

Oh, it's true. You knew that, too. So why are you here, I wonder?

Is it to hear what happened next?

Why do you even care?

They unchained me from that grate later, after my father was killed. What's that? He wasn't killed? Oh, he might as well have been, thrown in jail, without his bending.

But instead of a jail, they threw me in an insane asylum, with deranged scum. I was fine! I'm fine!

Oh, I'm sorry for shouting at you. I'm trying to work on my temper.

So I lived there. Sometimes people would come and visit me, there in my little white box. They would ask me questions about how I was feeling, and at first they didn't like my answers. I could tell. But then I started getting different flavored food, and they liked my answers a bit better. For a while there my life was hazy and happy. I was "making progress." I felt… good. Whatever they were doing to me, it was a relief.

But then she came. She came, and she tried to hug me and tell me we'd be a family again and make up for lost time but her eyes were like daggers and her claws dug into my back and all the pressure came back and I screamed. Then I closed my eyes for a minute, and the next thing I knew, my visitors were back, telling me I had done something Very Bad. I knew nothing about it, of course.

But life isn't fair, is it? Especially to me. So they moved me from my white space into a tinier black room with guards. Then it made sense! Of course. That woman had tried to kill me, so I needed protection.

I settled back into life in my own little space. My food tasted even more strongly of that peculiar flavor now, and sometimes I couldn't do anything but stare with glazed eyes at my walls.

Until he came.

The new, high and mighty Firelord stormed into the room next to my box, iron bars separating the two spaces. That's where my visitors sat now.

"How nice of you to visit, brother," I said. I meant it. I really did.

"Why did you do it?" He was angry and close to tears.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," I said, but some little voice in the back of my head said, you do, you do, you know exactly what he's talking about, and some stronger voice- you did nothing! You're a good girl- silenced it.

Zuzu roared, sending a fireball an inch away from my face

I didn't even twitch.

He wildly searched my eyes for a moment, then, defeated, put his head in his hands and started sobbing. Through the bars, I reached out and put a hand on his shoulder. He was sorrowful now, but couldn't he see why I did it? Didn't do it.

He had to be walked out of the room by my other visitors.

"Nice seeing you, Zuzu," I called.

After that, not many people came to visit me. I was all on my own. It's kind of sad, really. I lived day in and day out there, but I was perfectly fine. So what if my family hated me? Father still loved me. I know he did. And those treasonous bitches that deserted me at the Boiling Rock… well, they could rot. So, yes, I was fine. Just a little bored, I suppose.

Then I got sick. I was very, very ill. I laid in my bed for days and days, and wasn't able to keep any food down. That's when Father started visiting me, at night, when the guards were drowsy.

The first night he came, I was surprised.

"Father!" I cried when I saw his shadow in the room adjacent.

He moved closer to my bars, and I could see the moonlight from the window in his room glint off of his crown.

"Daughter. I am proud of how you have handled yourself through this trying affair. Zuko told them you were insane so they would imprison you here."

"Thank you, father," I said, grateful for him, at least, believing in my sanity.

"Now, daughter," he said. "I have not yet retaken the throne. So you must pretend you have heard nothing of this."

I eagerly nodded, and he continued.

"After I have retaken my rightful place as Firelord, you may come out of this place forever," he said, turning up his nose. "But until then, I need you to work to make them trust you. Soon will be the time for you to escape and kill the Avatar."

I was in awe. He still trusted me… after I failed to stop Zuko?

"I will, Father! I promise!"

Father laid a cold hand on my head, and with a sinister smile, he melted back into the shadows. I collapsed against a wall, excited beyond belief at this new plan.

Every few weeks he would return, always at night. He would ask me about how I was gaining their trust, and was pleased with the results. It was true- my visitors did trust me more now. It was too bad they didn't know Father had told me to stop eating their food.