A/N: This is (loosely) based on some experiences of my own, because they say "write what you know," right?
I also wanted to write a fic from the point of view of the "common people," because I imagine the events of Sozin's Comet would be quite an upheaval for them. And I realize that Zina's a bit like Mai, but I don't think she's nearly that extreme.
BTW, this isn't the school from "The Headband"...I saw it as being closer to the middle of the archipelago.
Zahra had a problem. She was in love with Fire Lord Ozai, and no one understood!
It hadn't always been like this. There were pictures of the Fire Lord in every classroom, every public building, and most homes, so she was used to them. The pictures had been changed when she was nine, when the old Fire Lord died, but she only started truly noticing them about a year ago. How had she gone so long without seeing those high cheekbones, and those full, sensual lips, and those eyes which stared deep into her very soul?
She would have preferred to keep this love a secret, but unfortunately that was impossible. Every morning when they did the Fire Oath, Zahra blushed furiously all the way through it. Students weren't supposed to take their eyes off the picture, but she knew they were sneaking glances at her. This just made her blush even harder. Lately, she'd also started to feel funny down there, but at least no one could see that.
She even dreamed about the Fire Lord at night. One time, it had been a particularly good dream where she was sitting on his lap. But right as it was getting to the good part, Zahra's mother knocked on her door to wake her up for school! Zahra was so furious!
If only she weren't stuck at this insignificant school, on this insignificant island! Zahra knew that the Fire Lord occasionally visited schools to inspect them, but those were the prestigious schools in and around the Capital City. Even though it was futile, Zahra wished with all her heart that something would compel the Fire Lord to visit this school. Then he would notice how Zahra had more love for the Fire Nation than any other student, and he'd overlook her disappointing boobs and her acne. The Fire Lord would be so touched that he'd whisk her away to his palace and give her fancy robes and jewelry and servants! Zahra supposed that they'd have sex, too, but she wasn't quite sure what to think about that yet. She kind of just skimmed over that part in her daydreams.
Fantasies aside, the only even slightly realistic chance she'd ever have to meet the Fire Lord would be the senior trip. Every year, the top twenty students in the graduating class would get to go on a week-long trip to the Capital, which included a day-long excursion to the Caldera. And the only way to get to go on that trip was to keep one's grades up. Zahra's parents were very proud of how well she did on her schoolwork, but of course she could never tell them the real reason for that!
As part of this, Zahra did as many extra-credit assignments as she could. More often than not, these were research projects about the Fire Nation history or the royal family. So she could pretty safely say that she knew more about the Fire Lord and his family than at least anyone else in her class.
Her classmates tended to look at her funny when they thought she didn't notice, but no one had said anything…until now.
"Zahra, I'd really suggest that you tone down this obsession with Ozai," Zina said out of the blue as they were walking home. It would be stretching it to call Zina her friend, but they lived just a few houses apart from each other, and their parents had always made them play together growing up. So it was only logical that they walk to and from school together too. Usually they didn't talk much, so Zahra was caught off-guard.
"You're not supposed to call him by his name!" was all she could think to say in response.
"Well, okay. You should tone down your obsession with the Fire Lord, then. Now, don't get me wrong," here Zina paused to check if anyone was within earshot of them, "I love the Fire Lord like I love our country. But I don't love him in that way. He's old…what is he, like, forty?"
"Forty-one," Zahra answered automatically, then mentally cursed herself. And…she was blushing again. Great.
"And you're fifteen," Zina pointed out flatly.
Zahra knew she should have either kept her mouth shut or said something noncommittal to try to end the conversation, but she couldn't help herself. She blurted out, "But Fire Lady Ilah was sixteen when she married Fire Lord Azulon, who was about forty. And Princess Azula was betrothed for a short time when she was thirteen…to a man older than the Fire Lord!"
"But they're royalty…they do things differently than us. You…well, to be frank, it's embarrassing to watch. Can't you at least have a crush on Prince Zuko like all the other royal fangirls?"
"That's why. I don't want to do what everyone else does!"
Zina raised an eyebrow, but decided against pressing the issue further. They walked the rest of the way back quietly. Zahra did not find it easy to speak to other people, and even that short conversation had drained her.
A couple of weeks later, it was the Day of Black Sun, and they got a special break from classes to watch the eclipse. The next day, they learned that Prince Zuko was a traitor. Again. Zahra resisted telling Zina, "I told you so!" but she certainly thought it. They did not discuss the subject further, and maintained an awkward silence on all of their walks.
Not much happened for a while after that. The three-week midsummer break came and went much too quickly, and they were back in school while it was still sweltering out. Now, at least, everyone was flushed during the Fire Oath because they were so hot! Zahra had heard that the Royal Palace had some kind of central cooling system…but they had to make do with paper fans.
Then, just when it seemed like everyone was on the verge of melting into puddles of heatstroke and boredom, Sozin's Comet approached! Zahra was thrilled to hear that the Fire Lord was now a Phoenix King. He must have been such a sight in that armor! Maybe they would even get a day off from school to celebrate the Phoenix King's great victory. Her teacher would tell Zahra to focus on the glory brought to the Fire Nation, not on any potential holidays, but at least it would be a nice bonus.
As it turned out, they did get a day off from school, but not for the reasons Zahra was hoping.
She'd gone to bed happy after getting to see the glorious comet at sunset. Sometime in the middle of the night, she'd been woken up by noise outside, but she'd just assumed it was people still celebrating. When Zahra woke up, she was excited because she knew there wasn't school that day, since she'd been allowed to sleep in. She bounded down to the kitchen to eat breakfast, but stopped dead at the looks on her parents' faces.
"Wh…what happened? Didn't we win?" she quavered as a sick feeling rose in her chest and stomach.
Zahra's mother and father exchanged looks, and then her mother said, "Well, honey, we don't know yet for sure exactly what happened. But the news is…the Fire Lor..I mean Phoenix King has been removed from power."
"They both were," her father corrected quietly.
"Oh yes…that's right. The Princess was Fire Lord now, wasn't she?"
That couldn't be right. Surely Zahra must have heard them wrong! But after a few seconds, it began to sink in.
"So…he's dead?" she managed to force out.
"We haven't heard specifically that he is, but again, we just don't know."
Zahra stood rooted to the spot for a short time longer, then abruptly regained the use of her feet and ran back to her room, slamming the door. She wanted to cry, but she was in too much shock to even do that.
After a while, she heard knocking on her door.
"Honey? You didn't eat your breakfast. Can I at least get you some tea?"
Zahra remained silent.
"You don't have to worry about our future, if that's what's bothering you. We'll find a way to manage."
Still no answer. After a few minutes, her mother apparently gave up.
Zahra stayed in her room all day, only leaving to use the bathroom. Her mother kept trying to get her to eat, but Zahra knew she wouldn't be able to keep anything down. Finally, in the evening, when she couldn't tolerate her empty stomach any longer, she rejoined her parents to eat a bit of rice, but still refused to talk to either of them.
Why were they even trying to keep things normal? Didn't they understand? The leader of this nation, the person Zahra looked up to over everyone else, was gone. How were they supposed to exist now? Zahra knew from her research that royal coups had happened multiple times in the past, but this was different. The Fire Lord had not only been her leader and inspiration, but her love!
The details slowly trickled out over the next few days. Apparently, Prince Traitor McTraitorpants (and his friends) had ousted his father and sister and locked them up, and people were going to just let him be crowned! He would be the youngest Fire Lord to ever rule without an official regent. Zahra had heard some disgruntled mutterings from the grown-ups, but when she protested, her parents just shushed her!
After a painful few weeks, life started falling back into a routine. School went on as usual, except that the pictures at the back of the classroom had been changed (with much grumbling from the custodial staff about how they just did this six years ago!). But the Fire Oath had been discontinued, so at least Zahra didn't have to look at the new picture. She had used to take trips to the back of the classroom to sharpen her writing-stick as much as possible, but now she used it until it wore down to a nub and couldn't possibly hold any ink.
The statue in the courtyard had been taken down as well, but there was no sign of that being replaced. The yard looked very bare without it.
"He would have had them take down the pictures, too, but that's where they drew the line," her father commented. Her mother shushed him, throwing a significant look in Zahra's direction.
But all in all, the transition was surprisingly seamless. The weather started to get slightly less hot, homework was still soul-crushing, and the planet didn't explode.
If Zahra didn't like this change in leadership, at least she was sort of learning to tolerate it. Then one day, she saw a group of teachers huddled in the courtyard during lunch.
"…disgusting. Absolutely disgusting. I didn't want to believe it," one teacher was saying.
"When the kid said he wanted an investigation to bring everything his father did to light, he wasn't fooling around!" put in another teacher.
"This isn't the version we'll be reading to the students, right?" asked a third.
"No, they'll hear an edited version. There are a few different ones for different grade levels." That was the second teacher again.
"Good. They don't need to know all that. Those poor children…"
"Ssh!" said the first teacher, having finally noticed that Zahra was listening in. All Zahra could do was run away before they punished her. But evidently they'd decided not to press the issue, since none of them chased her.
For the rest of the day, Zahra sat through her classes without being able to focus on the lessons. Her nerves wound up more and more tightly as the afternoon progressed. Then, finally, right before the last bell, the teacher said, "All right, class, this is mandatory listening, so pay attention."
Zahra's heart sunk further and further down in her chest the more she heard. That couldn't be right! All this time, she had admired the former Fire Lord so much, and he'd been committing terrible war crimes?! And the things he'd done to his own son…the teachers had said that this was the edited version. What could possibly be in the unedited version that was worse than this?
Somehow she managed to stay in her seat for the whole statement, but as soon as it was over, she bolted out of the room. Faintly, she heard the teacher shout out after her, but someone-that couldn't be Zina, could it?-shouted, "Leave her alone!"
She had hoped to keep from crying until she reached the relative privacy of the bathroom, but no such luck.
In all of the stories she'd read, when someone heard something horrible, they'd usually end up vomiting. For a minute, Zahra thought she'd do that too, but nothing came up. So she just sat on the toilet and sobbed her heart out.
After what seemed like forever, the tears abated a bit, and she realized that she'd be late for walking home with Zina. But she couldn't bear the idea of facing her like this!
As if the spirits were conspiring to make her life horrible, just then the bathroom door opened.
"I know you're in there, Zahra," Zina said.
All Zahra could do in response was sniffle and hiccup.
"I hope you're happy. I got cleaning duty for a week for talking back to the teacher," Zina added, then checked herself and said, "Well, no, that was dumb. Of course you're not happy."
"I'm…I'm so stupid!" Zahra finally managed to gasp out.
"Well, yeah. But you're a teenager. All teenagers are stupid."
"You're not…"
"Well, it was pretty stupid of me to say that stuff to you that one time. I was trying to make it so this wouldn't happen, but…I shouldn't have done that. It was rude. I'm sorry."
Zahra finally unlatched the door to gape at Zina.
"Now I'll warn you: some of our classmates are probably going to say some very rude things to you, now that they don't have to worry about getting in trouble for insulting the Fire Lord. But they'll get sick of it soon. I won't tell you to just ignore them, since that really doesn't work. But at least you'll know I've got your back."
"Wait, what?" Zahra said at this last part.
"I think it's safe to assume that we can call ourselves friends now," Zina stated wryly.
Zahra couldn't believe her ears. All this time, she thought Zina had hated her! It wasn't often that anyone wanted to be her friend, after all. She ran over and hugged Zina while squeaking "Thank you!" and trying not to dribble snot onto her uniform shirt. Zina seemed taken aback, but didn't pull away.
Well, things would still be rough-Zahra knew she had a lot of soul-searching ahead of her-but they might not be as completely hopeless as she'd feared. At least she wouldn't be alone.