Im the manager of the ember Island Eel Hound and my task was to write about the first time someone bended their element.
Azula's Only Good Memory
Chai Lu Mental Asylum - four years after the war
Doctor Liu Taishu was the most respected doctor in the asylum, not because he had a lot of experience or because he had degrees in areas other doctors didn't. He was respected because he was the only doctor in the asylum that had managed to build a good therapeutic relationship with Azula, the former Princess of the Fire Nation, and had started the recovery process of her damaged mind.
Two years had passed since she had been returned to the Asylum after escaping her brother's custody while they searched for their mother. Azula had escaped the custody of her brother and his friends but was later found and brought back to the Fire Nation.
In the first six months after Azula returned, very little progress had been achieved, and said progress was to be credited to Azula's only friend: Ty Lee. Then Dr. Liu managed to start the therapy within one short, twenty-minute conversation about a carnival that was currently visiting the capital.
When asked how he had managed to get her to talk when all the other doctors had failed, Dr. Liu replied Princess Azula had gone to that carnival as a child, since its opening ceremony is preceded by the Firelord.
In reality what happened was very different.
Dr. Liu entered and saw Azula, muttering and strapped to the floor. "If you talk to me, I can make your mother disappear."
Azula managed to look up. "How did you know about her? How can you possibly do that?"
"It's quite obvious to me," said Dr. Liu. "You were here for a year without saying much but then your brother comes and asks you to help in the search for your mother and then you jump in as if you had somehow regained your sanity. And when I mentioned her you looked up, something you haven't done with any other doctor."
Azula smiled, at last there was a doctor with some brains in his head. She liked him.
"What's in it for me?" Azula asked knowing the answer, waiting to see how this doctor played his cards.
"Everything, get your mind back and you walk out of here a free woman. You'll be able to see yourself in the mirror, the voices will stop and you'll be able to be with your girlfriend." the doctor explained with some satisfaction. His deductions had been enough to get her talking, now he needed her to keep talking."
"How'd you know about me and Ty Lee?" Azula asked, shocked someone had figured them out even though when Ty Lee had visited Azula, they had never been alone for too long.
"You just told me." The doctor smiled, hiding his surprise at being right about what seemed like a crazy theory, and kept his façade. "I figured so given your past: a brother you hated more than anything else in this world because he bonded with your mother while you couldn't, an abusive father who demanded perfection from an early age. You don't trust males; you despise them in your insides, so you seek love from women." In reality studies indicated there were basically a thousand reasons why she preferred women, but those reasons wouldn't lead the conversation where he needed it to go.
"So I cry my heart out to you, all the bad stuff goes away and I walk? That simple? What about Firelord Zuko?" said Azula, mockingly.
"Believe it or not he wants you to get better," said the doctor. "You're part of his denied childhood and he sees in you another person who suffered under your father, so he kind of cherishes you. Even if he won't admit it." Zuko had ordered that as soon as enough improvement was shown, Azula was to be transferred under medical supervision to the Palace.
The doctor crossed his arms and hardened his tone. "Here's a possible future for you: you talk and your mother fades, and you go back to the Capital, perhaps the Firelord will allow you to live in Kyoshi Island with Ty Lee and there you'll live the rest of your days in blissful exile." He was not supposed to talk to her like that, but if Dr. Liu had learned something in his life, it was that when the conventional doesn't work then the untried and unconventional will.
"How does talking about my issues makes me better?" Azula asked morosely, looking down. "It's for weaklings to talk of their problems to strangers."
"I'll show you," said the doctor. "Tell me the best memory you have of your mother, the happiest one." he asked, curious.
"Why would I do that?" asked Azula, staring at the floor.
"You see your mother as your tormentor because deep inside your head, in places you don't talk about, she embodies everything you fear, hate and, in general, everything you've kept to yourself over the years," said the doctor. "Your bad memories, your parents, all those traumas and problems you neglected over the years are what you see when you see her." A half-lie for the sake of a bigger purpose. "Talking about these problems will make her fade away, slowly, but the more you talk, the faster she'll go."
Azula was silent. She had never been mistreated by her father and her mother left her life early enough for her to barely remember her.
Dr. Liu waited, tense. Had he pushed too hard? Had he thrown away all the ground he had gained with the princess?
"The only good memory of my mother is the first time I firebent," Azula said suddenly. She deemed it possible there were certain… unresolved issues, so she decided to give it a shot. What's the worst that could happen? Could she make it any worse?.
"It was at the Unconquered Sun Carnival and I should've been, what? Four? Five?" Azula moved her head and held her gaze at the doctor's feet. "My grandfather had my father inaugurate the thing and we were all there in formal robes, there were all kinds of firebenders: fire breathers and those people that summon dragons and komodo rhinos from the flames. It was pretty nice to see it." Azula started to feel a weird sensation: she started to feel happy at the memory.
"I remember trying to imitate their moves in one of the gardens and making the sounds of the flames as I tried to recreate the routine to summon a dragon out of the flames." Surprising both of them, Azula giggled. The doctor couldn't suppress a smile at seeing the progress he had just achieved.
"I threw a punch and a small flame came out, and I remember yelling so hard the guards came running thinking there was an intruder trying to do something to me." Azula looked up to the ceiling, her eyes rolling to the back of her head as if she had the memory there.
"I tried it again but that time nothing came out, and I was so frustrated and I got all angry and kept trying and trying and then dad came in and asked: 'what are you doing, Azula?'. Back then he was different from the Ozai that sat on the throne. I told him that I could firebend, but when I tried nothing came out. He huffed and said that I should just keep playing around." Azula looked down. The doctor was shocked at the tears she could no longer hold back.
"I felt so bad, and Zuko then came back with mom from one of his first firebending classes and he saw me trying to firebend. He mocked me telling me that I would never be able to bend, but then mom came in and she told him not to be mean to me. She scolded her favorite child for me." Azula started sobbing and crying louder, as if a lovesick girl over a lost love.
"She then held me and told me not to worry; that she believed I could do it and then I tried but nothing came out and I started to try again and again until I started crying but my mom patted me on the head and told a servant to get me my favorite dumplings. She told me she was proud that I was trying, instead of giving up." The doctor had never seen progress like this.
"We ate together and she told me it was okay, and then she cheered me up, but I felt like a liar and then tried again and I got a big flame out and then my mom was surprised and she told me she was proud because Zuko hadn't made one that big yet. And in that moment I was so happy that she had believed in me." Azula had forgotten her mother being like that. What had changed between them?
"Why didn't I remember that before?" asked Azula, sobbing. "I always thought of my mother as the first to be afraid of me, not someone like that. Why am I remembering that just now?"
"Because when you thought of your mother, you saw all the bad things in your family, what was missing," the doctor replied. "You never stopped to truly see what your family was. For all these years you blamed her for everything that felt odd in your life and that you had no control over. Now that you realized she wasn't who you thought she was, you realized all those things you said and thought are lies." Kneeling, the doctor took out a handkerchief and gently wiped her tears. "This was a great session. Try to see if you remember anything more in a little bit, since it's not uncommon for more of a memory to appear after thinking about it. But for now try to rest. Catharsis can be a hell of an experience." The doctor left proud of himself, but also of his patient, who had started the slow process to full recovery.