AN: This is for the Royal Family Week thing going on with Tumblr right now, the Resemblance prompt isn't until later in the week, but i'm going out of town so yayyy posting two days early. If you've been reading my multi chapter modern Maiko fic, Fall, then you know it centers more around Mai and her story, but i've been wanting to get a little bit of a look at Zuko's life in the modern verse with a dash of Azula too.
Resemblance
The phone rings and Zuko expects it's the police calling him back about his report on their latest runaway.
She's sixteen, he tells them, just barely over five-foot five, brown hair and pale skin, light brown eyes. They don't find her.
This is the third time she's disappeared in the middle of the night, somewhere between the beginning of dad's liquor bottles, her absence being known only when the kitchen counter is littered with them, empty.
Zuko remembers the first time. At thirteen Azula managed to go missing for three days, little to no police help, and nothing but an old school picture to go off of. Still, three years later, Zuko's kept the photo thumb tacked to a small bulletin board, next to mother's. They smile the same, soft, mouth closed, eyes bright and focused. She remembers how Azula said she hated the resemblance.
Both of them would spend their lives denying their similar counterparts. All of the "family business" gatherings where people would mention how much Zuko looked like his father, when Uncle Iroh would tell his sister that she had Ursa's eyes. Unlike their father, Zuko had never caused Azula to run, he had never lost her to blurred vision, or his palm to her cheek. That was father, drowning in the bottom of whiskey bottles and rage.
The thought brings him back to the night of last rampage, the day mom had run, watching her husband stumble and blunder over the coffee table, knocking books from shelves, glasses from cabinets, slurred speech over nonsense. He remembers after, how mom had packed them all one bag, but he and Azula never made it through the front door.
And yet, neither of them could resist the flow. Zuko searches her room for hints, only finding carvings of shapes in the wood of her desk, and burnt up paper balls in the trash bin. Of course she'd be sure to cover her tracks, made sense for someone not wanting to be found.
Another matter of likeness, he thinks, the ability for her to disappear without a trace. almost ten years, save a few months where they were naive enough to think their mother would come back. Even worse, when he thinks about it, the anger springs up, heat in his chest, palms trembling, holes in the wall when it becomes too much.
The second time Azula left, about a year ago they found her in the next town over, eyeliner streaks from tears, pack of cigarettes in one pocket, drugs in the other. They bring her home, much to Zuko's relief, suggesting help and other remedies. He doesn't console her.
"You should be used to this, Zuzu." She says, falling back into his mattress and staring up at the ceiling, "After months you stop looking."
"You weren't gone that long."
"But we can pretend, can't we?" Azula smirks, eyes shifting to make contact with his, "There's a cycle, Brother. I run, you stay, you come, I go. Up and down, forward and back, it's all the same."
Zuko huffs, furrowing his brow, "You sound crazy."
"It wouldn't be the first time someone's said that to me."
"Won't be the last." He shrugs.
"You know what they call me on their little radios? They call me a runner. It sounds silly doesn't it?"
"Not really, what would be better?"
"It doesn't matter which is better. It's just silly. Did they call her that, you think?"
"Who?"
"You know exactly who, don't play any dumber than you are, Zuko."
"Mom? Well, maybe, probably—for a while. Now she's a missing."
"Runner, to missing, to gone." She sighs, turning away from him. "I know the steps, except, change gone to hidden, and you've got it."
"No more running away, Azula."
"I'm just following the nature of things." She shrugs, "You ought to try it."
His cellphone ringing pulls him back. An officer waits on the other line, no sign of her. Zuko gets up, plucking the picture off the bulletin board, listening as the person on the other line goes over their minimal leads.
I run, you stay, you come, I go. Up and down, forward and back.
She's right, it's all the same.
Zuko slips on his jacket, pressing the phone back to his ear, hearing them ask if he's still on the line.
The policeman sighs, "It just looks like you've got yourself, a runner."
He pauses a moment, looking up at the pictures of them both, "I know."