Note: This was originally posted to AO3 as an Order of the Lotus fic exchange, written for kaberett. The story uses a development from Part 2 of The Promise, hence has spoilers for that book. (Funny thing is, I didn't even read Part 2 myself.)
Departures
- An Avatar: The Last Airbender fanfic by Lunatique
Character—the willingness to accept responsibility for one's own life—is the source from which self-respect springs.
-Joan Didion, On Self-Respect
The road toward the docks glimmers ahead of her with the first hint of sunlight, a welcome sight after the blackest night she has ever known. Ahead of her stretches the dark of the unknown.
She pauses and looks over her shoulder as though pulled by an invisible string. The silent presence that follows at a distance reminds her that she must go on. She wonders if the guard, his face invisible behind the skull mask, is really there to escort her to the waiting ship or is under orders to kill her. She wonders if Ozai will let the man live to see the sunrise. She wonders if she will ever see her children again, and chokes on what is either a muffled scream or a bitter laugh.
She hurries on, a muffled shadow in the greying light, feeling the bonds to all that she leaves behind stretch behind her like bands of her own flesh, feels them tear and bleed with every step. And still she must not stop, must remind herself it was all worth it-
-for Zuko, that obtuse jerk. Mai shakes her head in irritation at the wetness and pattering of the little raindrops. Ugh, she hates being wet and cold. Why can't she run dramatically out on her boyfriend on a clear night like a sane person? She can hardly see the road down to the harbor, and the sparks of light from the lamps along the way confuse her more than anything, splotching the night in shades white and gold and grey.
The enshrouding robe makes it even harder to see her way, but taking her hood off would only add to the wet misery of the night. Besides, Zuko might have sent someone after her and being muffled in the robe helps her feel safer, like she were still a kid and her blankets felt like a real hiding place.
Yeah, sure Zuko sent someone after her, like His Broodiness the Firelord isn't too busy feeling royally sorry for himself. She doesn't even know why she keeps looking over her shoulder-
-whether in fear or in hope, as though there were still a road back for her, for any of them, Ozai or Zuko or Azula or
for Azulon
She walks against the blockage in her chest, every breath threatening a choking gasp like her aged father-in-law's last breath while the outline of the harbor comes into view below, the ship waiting at anchor limned in first light.
The lumps of deeper darkness standing by the ship grow into men as she approaches. She can feel their eyes as she walks down the pier. When she reaches the nearest of them he holds out a hand, palm up, which lights with a flame that burns in place. He gestures with his other hand as though to sweep back his hair and she understands she is to remove her hood.
She draws it back, her odd little scrap of safety on a morning when stronger stuff would not save her from torture and death if one tiny thing goes amiss. The light of the flame stabs her eyes as she stands unflinching, letting the man check the identity of their passenger. She tries not to notice that he and his fellows are dressed like merchant sailors yet move like soldiers.
The flame snuffs out, leaving a green-white ghost dancing before her eyes. The man gestures while his comrades disappear up the gangplank. A brusque hand grabs hold of her arm to pull her along, but she shakes it off and looks hard into the man's eyes until he turns away and walks ahead of her. She follows, the hem of her cloak scratching the wood of the pier.
She looks back on the deck; the armored guardsman has left her at some point. Perhaps he watches out of sight as she boards, ready to return and report to his master who may or may not let him live through the morning.
Her own life is no less contingent than his. If she has miscalculated Ozai's need to keep her alive, she would leave this ship quite a distance from land and not of her own volition. She cannot know-
-anything about what happens next, now that she's taken any semblance of certainty in her life, stabbed it in the gut, and kicked it down a long flight of steps. Hey, her feet might be wet, but at least she can make metaphors.
Maybe she should use those metaphors in long and depressing poetry about how dumb her ex-boyfriend is and how stupid she is for choosing to run out of the comfiest place in the Fire Nation into the rain. Nah, that's too depressing even for her.
No more thinking, because if she starts thinking too much she'll tuck herself away like a scared turtleduck. She walks out of the eaves of Harbor Way into the open where the rain falls on her full force, and clenches her teeth so they won't chatter. It's the cold, okay, not any sort of fear.
She goes down the line of ships at the piers until one lights a small flame at the bow just as she passes. She recognizes it now, the one she arranged no-question-asked passage on before she went in for her dramatic confrontation with Zuko. In what world was it a good idea to do that on a dark and stormy night anyway? Okay, maybe not stormy, more like drizzly, the point being that it was bad timing.
A sailor comes down to meet her. She takes the pouch from a sleeve and drops it with a jangle into his hand. Half up front, as promised. The man's eyes light up with the reflected light of gold as he counts.
"The amount is right," she tells him as she sweeps past. The men gathered at the bottom of the gangplank part for her like she were a knife flying to its target. See? Good metaphors. Technically a simile, sure, but why get technical?
She stands at the railing while the men board the ship, and hopes she looks too mysterious and unapproachable for anyone to come within a ten-feet radius. She just hopes these guys aren't perverts or robbers so she wouldn't have to put a bunch of knives in them, because then how would she move the ship by herself?
As the men run around doing sailor-things that somehow move a hunk of metal over the sea, a voice that sounds suspiciously like her mother's tells her how stupid she's being. She was right on track to be the Fire Lady, and now she's throwing it all away on an argument to be wet and cold on a ship surrounded by strange men.
The thought of the fit Mother will fly into makes the whole thing almost worth it by itself.
Mai remembers, though she doesn't want to, how Zuko brooded at her side the last time she was on a ship. She clutches the railing and looks down at the rain-dotted sea. Maybe it's not such a bad idea to dive into the freezing water and crawl onto shore. Maybe she can watch him getting tangled in his self-contradictions until he twists around himself. Maybe she can live a little longer with being his crutch.
No. She bows her head so her hair falls on either side of her face. No, she can't.
She had known since she was little that there is a difference between "hard" and "impossible." This only hurts. Maybe it hurts a lot, but it's just pain. The alternative, though, is-
-impossible. She finds herself unable to complain about getting exactly what she bargained for. What matter if the taste it leaves in her throat is bitter?
As the ship trundles out to sea, her eyes search the jagged peak of the city as though she can see where her children lie. She pictures Zuko caught in the dark warmth of slumber, while Azula's eyes gleam in the half-light as plans whir through her mind.
She watches until the peak of the volcano dips below the horizon. Her son's head droops against her shoulder and her daughter's hand slips from hers, and she cannot imagine-
-making any other choice, for herself or for Zuko. In the end she has no regrets, and knows she can have none.
Stripped of so much that once defined her, it is strange to stand in the light of dawn as though she looks in a mirror to see someone else's face. She cannot dream of a more beautiful day or a clearer sun, no matter what life brings her on this new day.