Hello again. Once again, more Angst!Zuko for you to get twitchy about.
This time, I've decided to approach a possible mini-drabbles about Zuko's train of action that led to him joining Aang and company, thus leading to the complete Team Avatar! (Except for Suki. And, if you go by the end scene in Avatar Aang, Mai and Iroh. But that's just me.)
The inspiration of this came from reading the entry for Madness Mantra on TVTropes. Which in turn happened after I was watching Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. To wit, I now realize something: Firebenders would make AWESOME Gunmen operators. And that's all I have to say...about that.
Also, note that some aspects of Vathara's Embers have shown up here. If you like Zuko awesomeness and would like a deeper look in the cultures of Avatar, check it out. I'll be waiting. I'm not a clown, I will not bite you and throw you in the basement. OR WILL I? Nah, I won't. You can trust me. OR CAN YOU? Sure you can. I believe me that believes my word. OR DO I? Yeah, I'm going to stop doing that now. OR AM I?
Disclaimer: Avatar: I make no claim to anything.
...
It starts five nights after he's returned home.
He knows he should be happy. He's dreamed of this for three years, thirsted for it; it was this beautiful ideal that drove him follow tiger-seals under polar ice and follow the Avatar's group across the world. He's returned home, to island-chains and proper marshlands and people with eyes like his and who don't say firebender like it's something monstrous and foul when they realize what he is. He should be happy.
He doesn't know why he isn't, or why his father's words of acceptance and pride ring hollow.
...
The nightmares start mildly; that horrible moment of lightning crashing and a boy he half-thought as the closest thing he had to a friend screaming and falling to the earth. The Water Tribe girl summons her wave, but she's not fast enough before Azula and her Eathbenders get to his body and do what they choose to before they turn on the girl, bloodied and roaring with inner-flames; the Dai Li are nearly Firebenders in their intensity and drive, and they fight as a Firebender does. All speed, ferocity and dragon's-rage.
Zuko wakes up, soaked with sweat and feeling horror's claws grip his stomach before he wonders why the thought should horrify him so.
They escalate, night after night. It soon reaches the point where Zuko dreams of a world of ash and copper-crying blood; Earth burnt to dust and Water screaming into steam, the memory of Air still roaring for justice while Fire becomes something monstrous and unkind, a sick parody of itself and no Avatar to stop the madness and himself on a mountaintop with a ruined temple where the skeletons of Air Nomads are piled up like scythed wheat and the wind lashes with sharp ice like so much hatred, Zuko watching the world burn because of this thing he has done.
He begins taking medicine for sleepless dreams, without anyone knowing. The knowledge that those dreams still wait for him still torture him.
...
After he lies to his uncle, says those horrible things that he soon wants to take back even sooner than the things that torture him in his head, he wakes up to realize that he's talking in his sleep.
He doesn't know why. He instructs the servants to avoid his chambers before he wakes up.
It wouldn't do for word to get out that he's muttering I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry over and over again in his sleep.
...
Zuko becomes aware that the healers are begining to notice that medicine supplies are running low. He can't let himself be discovered, so he stops hoarding stolen remedies for awful dreams.
It's not an easy decision.
The nightmares return at once, and the morning after the first night, he wakes up on the floor and all he can think about are blue Airbender tattoos ruined by a bolt of lightning, blue eyes hurt and betrayed, and a tired voice asking him If we'd known each other then, do you think we could have been friends too?
He had to admit then, even after the Avatar had broken his word and parole, that the answer had been yes.
...
The sixth time he wakes up and realizes he's clutched his arm so tight that his fingernails have laid bloody trackmarks into his skin, Zuko can't lie to himself anymore.
He wears long sleeves so no one notices until they heal.
Zuko starts pushing himself too far in his personal training, punching walls until his knuckles ache and his skin splits, and he decides that he hates himself. He also tells himself he doesn't know why.
He's still lying.
...-
The nightmares are getting worse
He's begining to see mountains of sinuous skeletons with decayed wings in his sleep. He's had this dream before, after he realized the implications of Great-Grandfather Sozin's hunting of the dragons, but now he sees massive skeletons with sux legs and horns, and massive clawed ones that belong to the earth.
Zuko starts making bets with himself on how long it'll be before the people of the other nations start showing up in his nightmares and make dead-mountains of their own.
The Air Nomads have their own soon enough.
...-
He had problems Firebending now. The fires that used to blaze out from his spirit and burn the air aren't hot enough. It's getting harder to make the fire at all, and when it comes, it feels like ashes spewing out of his soul.
He tries not to let it alarm him, tries not to let people notice his growing horror at his own inner fire dying, like one of his arms unexpected rotting off in the middle of his day. He turns to the sun, to Agni, and begs for an answer.
He gets no answer. The spirits have never been kind to him, and he wonders if perhaps he has returned the favor this time. He focuses his training on existing flame, like he did as a younger child, and he almost fools himself into thinking that there isn't something wrong with him.
...
Zuko can't remember what his dreams are about anymore.
He's already woken up once mumbling Azula always lies Azula always lies Azula always lies and being afraid that he's ignored his own knowing.
...
Zuko can't lie about himself anymore.
After he's sent to the beach with Azula, Mai and Ty Lee, he forces himself to admit to his anger. And now, after that burst of Firebending when he did, he can barely make fire at all anymore.
He can't breathe fire to warm himself, only a rush of hot air that tastes wrong to him.
He wants to talk to Uncle, but he's afraid to face him.
...
The morning before that awful war meeting, when his own words spell the doom of the Earth Kingdom, Zuko has a peculiar dream of the Air Nomads.
He doesn't quite understand it. They are not charred skeletons or raging hurricanes as he has sometimes dreamed of. They are simply men and women with gray eyes and wearing yellow robes, watching him like a pygmy puma watches a kitten.
One man, reminding him painfully of Aang - the Avatar - remarks that he has not broken his promise yet.
Zuko does not understand.
The old man smiles, his long mustache blowing gently when he speaks, and he speaks of old promises that Zuko doesn't remember. Zuko has the impression that the old man is speaking of another person and Zuko himself at the same time. It's a confusing matter.
He reminds Zuko that he already knows that all Benders touch the other elements within themselves. Fire is drive, loyalty and power, but it is other things to. He burns the air, and Zuko should remember that Air is freedom. He has the freedom to cast aside the horrors of what he has done and do what he must.
Zuko does not understand then.
He does after the meeting.
...
The morning of the eclipse, Zuko has a dream of a world that burns again.
This time, he beholds a tapestry of himself as Fire Lord. Behind him, all is ashes.
Horror rises at the implication and he knows that this is not ever what he wanted.
He remembers that when he makes his decision.
...
The first night after he joins the Avatar - Aang - and sleeps in a room that once belonged to an Air Nomad, with little to his name but a picture of Uncle and a sweaty shoe, Zuko has no dreams of a world that burns with maddened fire, nor does he see his mistakes magnified and monstrous as he often does.
He does not remember what this dream is about, but when he quietly finds that breakfast is about, Aang hesitantly asks him why he kept muttering about man-eating turtleducks. Zuko can only stare at him and wonder why himself.
Oh well. If he's gone mad in his sleep, at least it's not out of guilt.