Writer's Note: This hefty fic was written for Avatar Big Bang 2010 over on LJ, and now that it's done, I can finally post it here! Unlike there, I will be dividing it into chapters, just to save the eyeballs. This is probably one of the few fics I can honestly say I tried my ass off with, and I think it shows. So here it is!
Prologue
Suki was the kind of girl who was always willing to give a second chance to anyone. She was always ready with the benefit of the doubt.
Mai was the kind of girl who guarded herself carefully, who gave only one chance that, if broken, was never given again.
When it came to each other, they found their roles, strangely, reversed. The air between them was tense, to put it mildly. It was a week after Ozai's downfall and imprisonment, a week of healing and reunion. With Ozai incarcerated and Azula held in an asylum, the Fire Nation was overcome with a sense of stunned and confused silence. The aftermath was so sudden, so startling, that all they could do was wait for some kind of sign that things were back on track once more.
But let's start at the beginning. Or rather, an end.