Hello there, fellow ATLA fanatics!
This is my first Avatar fanfic - written to reconcile my overwhelming feels about what happened to Azula at the end of "the Search". The scene I wrote out is mostly a novelization of the last few pages of that comic, starting from when Zuko leaps forward to heroically defend his mother. :3
And since I am a failure at writing Author's Notes (or coming up with titles, for that matter) let me just spare you the pain of reading this any longer...
Okay, lights, laptop, ACTION!
She's not sure if she's trying to kill him, or just lash out at him till he begs for mercy.
Her blue flames are aimed randomly – at his face, his torso, his arms, blindly just trying to make him hurt. To make him burn, the way her whole world is burning, going up in flames until all she can see is fire and ashes.
CRACK!
Her foot swings into the sparse furniture in the little house – the cupboards, this time.
FWOOM!
Blue fire crackles, heaves, as dangerous and insane as its master.
WHOOSH!
Her blazing fist comes so, so close to melting and disfiguring the other half of his face. Right now, she wants him to crumble to the floor, the way she struck him down after their last Agni Kai. She wants to watch him writhe on the ground, surrounded by her flames; she wants him to look at her the way he used to look at her.
With fear.
But there's no fear now; just a determination she's never seen on his face before – a prince – no, a king – fighting for the ones he loves.
Love…
That's why she wants him to fall.
Because of his foolish weakness.
He loves.
And she's glad he doesn't –
SLASH!
Love –
CRACK!
Her.
WHAM! FWISH! ZING!
"Oh, for crying out loud!" she rails at him, falling back; she's panting, and black spots are fizzing at the edges of her vision. Balls of lightning spit and crackle at each fingertip. "Hold STILL!"
"Don't do it." He sounds like Ozai almost; each word hitting her in the heart. "I told you already, I know how to deal with your lightning. I can redirect it anywhere."
She stares at him, almost hyperventilating now. He's so weak. So WEAK! She could crush him like the lotus petal he is. She could stab him where it would hurt the most – but all the sadistic things she used to run by his ear are gone, dried up into nothingness. Her mind is blank but for one thought:
Why HIM?
Why HIM?
Why is he always getting in her way?
WHY CAN'T SHE STRIKE HIM DOWN?
"AAARGH!"
Her frustration tears out of her throat in a yell, and she fires at him the most powerful bolt of lightning she can muster.
KA – RACK!
Engulfed in its blue-white light, he stretches out his arms – graceful as a river current – and catches the bolt on two fingers.
And then, just as he said he would, he redirects it – right back at her.
KRAAKABOOM!
She feels a white-hot flash of pain and crashes backward into the smoldering remains of an armoire, groaning as it's consumed by blue flames. Her head throbs, spins, and when she looks up, she first sees Fire Lord Sozin standing before her – and then she blinks, and the illusion turns back into HIM.
"Don't you get it, Zuzu?" she cries out. "You and I will finally be free!" She can't help hearing the raggedness of her voice, the furious desperation. "You of a throne you never wanted, and me of this incessant nagging in my head!"
Behind him, that woman – Noriko, her mother – no, NOT her mother! She has NO MOTHER! – is staring, her face clouded by a thousand battling emotions.
She ignores the filthy peasant now. Her eyes, burning from the smoke, are fixed on him. His scarred face, which could be the face of a monster – but instead, it's the face of true honor.
"No," he says quietly – WHY WON'T HE GET ANGRY? WHY WON'T HE GET ANGRY SO SHE CAN RAGE AT HIM, DESTORY HIM – "You're wrong."
Her chest is heaving.
"Oh, stop kidding yourself!" she hurls at him, whipping the folded-up letter out of her pocket, crushing it between her two fingers. "The other morning, when you had me over the cliff, why didn't you just let go? You could have gotten rid of me AND the letter!"
Hysteria is starting to take over, and her features twist into a mirthless smile.
"It would have been so easy!" she exclaims. Her vision lurches, and for a moment, there are two of him standing there, then three, then just one again. "Admit it! You need ME to help you be free!"
But he's not even looking at her. He's pulling his own treasure out of his pocket – the Fire Lord's crown. The one that should have been on HER head. He looks down at it, then looks up again – straight into her eyes.
"Deep down, I know – I've always known – that the throne is my destiny." He gathers his dark hair into a topknot and attaches the crown to it.
And for a moment, all of her arguments die on her tongue, because he's not the fragile spring blossom she knew as a child, nor the angry whiner he was during his journey to capture the Avatar.
He's admirable, venerable, and unquestionably honored.
He is the Fire Lord.
And what does that make her?
"That morning on the cliff…" His eyes reflect her blue firelight. "Azula, our relationship is so messed up. It's been like that as long as I can remember. And maybe it'll be like that for the rest of our lives."
He pauses here, and looks down at her, sprawled on the floor at his feet, just barely pushing herself upright. Something in his eyes flickers.
"But one fact never changes," he says quietly. "No matter what, you're still my sister."
That's when she loses all sense of everything else, because she refuses to comprehend what those words imply – what he might be trying to say…
And that is when the thin thread that's been holding her together breaks.
"Shut up," she whispers.
His words are crashing in her ears like seawater in a cave, hammering their way into her mind, no matter how desperately she shoves them away, and the only thing she can do is block out the turmoil inside her with a roar –
"SHUT UP!" she yells again, her voice shattering, and blindly she flings a fireball at him. He blocks it without a flinch, the hot waves of air blowing back his hair and robes, his crown glinting –
She can't stand the sight of him any longer.
The letter flutters to the ground as she runs, still blinded by tears she doesn't realize she has in her eyes.
KRASH!
She bursts out the door, running, running, running –
"Azula!"
He's calling out to her, but she doesn't CARE! She DOESN'T! He means NOTHING to her!
"Come back!"
She WON'T!
"Come back! Please!"
NO!
She sees them all in front of her; Azulon to her left and Ozai to her right, and Ursa – in her Fire Princess robes and crown, arms outstretched – is calling her too:
"I can help you!"
His voice is almost overpowering Ursa's, but they're both saying the same thing; their voices combine into a force that propels her even farther away –
"I WANT to help you!"
That's just his voice now. All the others – her grandfather, her mother, her father – vanish, and now…
It's just him.
She jerks around sharply to face him, hardly aware of the burning tears pouring down her face, and hurls at him her last feeble blow:
"Same as always, Zuzu." Her voice is cracking. Broken. "Even when you're strong – you're weak."
Then she turns on her heel and runs straight ahead, past thick bushes and tall grasses and straight towards a pass between two cliffs –
And she runs and runs, into the deadly heart of Forgetful Valley, which is a place surely less tormented than the inside of her head –
And she runs, and at every turn she hears his voice, even though he stopping calling long since:
"AZULA!"
Azula!
Azula…
Zula…
azula.
He loves.
He loves a lot of things.
He loves his nation and his honor, his dao swords and his scroll of pictures of his mother, holding them both as little children.
She loves things, too.
A lot of them.
She loves power. Power and strength, and strategy and wit and burning flames.
That kind of love – she can handle it.
But he loves more.
He loves his friends and his people, his servants and his soldiers. He loves his Mai like no one else and his Uncle Iroh more than anyone in the world.
He loves.
He loves…
He loves….
He…
Loves…
He…
Is…
A… liar.
He does not.
Love.
Her.
I loves critique. I loves it very much...
But I wouldn't say no to a long, flowy review, either. ;)
hint, hint...