AN: I think this might be my most creative ATLA story yet. I hope y'all like it. Clearly there are going to be non-canon pairings in this story, but I didn't undo the canon. I just gave it a different continuation. The search and the promise happen, but the comics and the tv show had some inconsistencies with the ages of of the characters, so I decided the search happened in 101AG and Azula ran into the Forgetful Valley in April of that year.
I have a fair number of OCs, which I usually try not to do because people want the characters that actually engaged them during the show, but they are mostly children of the canon characters, so hopefully that makes up for it.
107 AG (Seven years after Sozin's Comet)
In a small Earth Kingdom town, not too far from Omashu, a five year old girl was playing with her three year old brother. She had her father's medium skin tone, but her mother's black hair and golden eyes. In contrast, her little brother had their mother's fair skin, but their father's slightly lighter hair and green eyes. Although they looked nothing alike, and their attitudes were different, they were as close as siblings could be, playing cops and robbers in the yard.
"I wanna be the cop," Hiro yelled at his sister.
"Fine, but I'm stealing your loot," Rei claimed as she grabbed an make believe bag of jewels and started to run.
"In the name of the law, I order you to stop!" He chased his sister around the yard. She was faster, but she tired more easily. He tried to corner her.
Inside the cottage, Mina was making noodles, slamming them against the table as she stretched them out. Her children's favorite food was ramen and she made it at least once a week. They'd eat it every day if they could.
Her husband Haru was working. He was the lead engineer for the new train system they were building connecting their small town to Omashu. If this project proved successful, they would be connecting the trains from Omashu to Gaoling and from Omashu to Ba Sing Se, offering a new alternative to the expensive sky ship.
Mina watched warmly as her children played. She remembered along time ago when she and her older brother would play on the beach, but she hadn't seen her brother in years. She hoped her children never lost their closeness.
The mother was four months pregnant. She hoped her new baby boy or girl fit in just as well. She hung the noodles to dry. Now she was tired.
When Haru came home, he could smell a familiar scent in the air. "I love ramen."
"Me too!" Hiro yelled.
"I love it more," Rei told him.
He scooped up his children and hugged them in one go. "We're lucky that your mother makes it for us aren't we?"
"We're the luckiest!" Rei told her dad before she kissed his cheek.
"How was work Dad?"
"It was good. The project is back on schedule."
"Will we get to take the train to Omashu when it's done?" Rei asked him.
"If I can afford it," he teased.
"They should let us ride free given all the work you do for them," Mina kissed her husband on the face. "We missed you today."
"I know." He put down his children and affectionately put his hand on his wife's stomach. "Growing every day."
"Tell me about it. You like keeping me fat and off my feet."
"I just want more of you to love."
Haru couldn't believe his good fortune. He was married to the most wonderful woman. He had two healthy, happy children and he was about to add a third. He had finally gotten the promotion he had been waiting for and some day, he'd be able to take his family on trains all over the country.
He smelled smoke. "What is that?"
Rei put out the flame. "Oops." She accidentally caught the tapestry on fire.
"What have I told you about firebending in the house?"
"Make sure Mom doesn't catch me."
Mina folded her arms and looked at her husband.
"Oops. New rule, no more firebending in the house unless it is to turn on a lamp."
The kids ran upstairs to escape punishment.
"You're lucky I hate that tapestry," Mina said to her husband.
"I'm also lucky that Hiro can't earthbend yet. I have a feeling he'll break the house."
"Well, you're a master bender. You can fix it until you can teach them that their bending is for outside use only."
"I have to convince them."
"They are your children."
"They're always my children when they break stuff and your children when they master something."
"I know right. It's the privilege that comes with going through childbirth."
He kissed her nose. "I adore you so much."
In the Fire Nation Palace, Zuko received bad news from his advisors. "Your popularity is dwindling my Lord."
When the war had just ended, Zuko had been quite popular. People liked that the polluted factories were closing and their men were coming home, but after years of paying high taxes to cover the reparations and droughts, people were hungry and angry that their Fire Lord was giving them the business for the wealthy peons in the Earth Kingdom. What started off as a few loyalists griping, has grown into a larger movement, calling for the return of their long missing Princess.
"No one will let her rule. She's crazy."
"Perhaps my Lord, but if she were to get married and have a child, a firebending child, that child could take the throne with her husband as the regent. She could be kept out of the political sphere while her husband ruled."
Zuko frowned. The world leaders might accept that if her husband was benevolent.
"Who would she marry?"
"If she were smart, she would marry someone who had opposed her during the war, like Master Sokka."
Sokka had divorced from Suki and had sole custody of Hakoda II, their two-year-old son. Suki and the warriors were no longer protecting Zuko. They have now returned to Kyoshi Island. Fire Lady Mai had been sad to see them go. She and Suki had become close when she returned to the palace, but the new team was quite formidable. No serious attempts on the throne had occurred in years.
Living with Mai and Zuko were, Crown Princess Ursa, their four year old, Lady Ursa, Zuko's mother, her husband Ikem and their daughter Lady Kiyi. It was a home where women reigned supreme.
"You think Sokka would do something like that." Zuko sounded cross.
"He was just an example. My point is if she wants her way back in, now is the perfect time for her to move and you may want to strike your own deal with her before she finds out how popular she has become."
Zuko sighed. "Thank you, that will be all."
The Fire Lord was tired. He was aging faster than he should be and the last thing he needed was to worry about his crazy sister usurping the throne and undoing all of his hard work. He needed to find her and stop her from joining the loyalists.
He requested his closest friends come to a meeting right away.
One week later, the Avatar and his wife Master Katara arrived with one year old Bumi as did her brother Sokka with Hakoda II. They left their children with the nurses on staff and proceeded to meet with Zuko and Mai.
After quick hugs, Zuko got to work. "I received a report that the loyalists are reaching out to my sister and trying to persuade her to usurp the throne from me. As you know, politics is a terse situation in the Fire Nation right now and we cannot afford any instability to the Crown. I need you to find my sister and detain her if she is involved in the conspiracy."
"What do we do if she's innocent?" Aang asked, not sure of what to do.
"You don't think she's innocent," Katara questioned.
"How would I know? No one's seen her in six years and just because there is a conspiracy, doesn't mean she even knows about it."
"If she isn't aware of it," Sokka started, "then telling her might just encourage her to act badly. She might think she has a shot when she could have given up a long time ago."
"Can you please locate her and see if she's up to anything?" Mai asked, not happy with this what if babble. "If she seems to have started a new life, then I suggest we leave her there, but if she hasn't then we need to know, now."
"Of course," Katara was ready to end the discussion anyway.
"Do you have any idea where she could be?" Sokka asked.
"She was last seen near the Forgetful Valley," Zuko told them. "If she did forget who she was, she might have just settled down in a small town nearby. We have no reports that she is in Capital City."
The trio got a map, trying to figure out where they should look and decided to plot a course.
"I hope we don't find her," Sokka said. "If she's not findable, then the loyalists might just give up."
"Maybe she's dead," Katara said dryly.
"Even better," he grumbled.
Aang didn't say anything. He wouldn't wish death on anyone, even Ozai.
About two weeks later, the heroes, sans their children who remained in the palace, headed to Hira'a and started to look. They heard of no sightings of the Princess and Sokka finally said. "She's probably changed her name. Who knows what she calls herself?"
"Well we did put up fliers and include a physical description," Aang offered. He wished Toph could have come with them, but she's 8 months pregnant and not even she is that risk loving.
They kept marching and eventually, they found a man who said, "maybe you should ask Haru. He and his father used to make the trip from here to Omashu a lot and they might have seen her."
"Haru used to come around here?" Sokka questioned.
"Yeah, I hear he got married and had kids, so he found a job that involved less travel."
"I didn't know he got married," Aang said.
"Yes you did," Katara told him. "I told you."
"When?"
"When we invited him to our wedding. He wrote back that his wife was too pregnant to travel and you said, 'I didn't know he got married.'"
"Oh, I must have forgot."
"Well, let's see what they know."
They got to Omashu only to learn that he had moved into a small town outside the city. They headed for his house and saw two kids playing in the street. One of them was just starting to earthbend.
"I did it Rei. I did it!"
"Let's show Mom."
She excitedly ran to the house with her brother. Aang wondered if those were Haru's kids when Katara stopped.
"What is it?"
"Look at the lanterns. The flame is blue." When firebenders get excited, they can turn a nearby flame blue. Rei did this when she ran, inadvertently revealing she was Azula's daughter.
"Azula!"
They ran to the house to see her with two kids. "Mommy! I can earthbend."
"Oh! Your dad is going to be so proud."
When Azula heard, "we know you're in there," she knew it was trouble.
"Go to the door and tell them that I will be with them in a minute," she told Rei. As Rei went to the front door, she escaped out the back and took off.
"My mom says she'll be right out," the little girl told them.
Aang smiled. She was cute. "Do you know your Mom's name?"
"Mina!"
Aang frowned. They had no idea who their mother was. This is going to be quite a shock for them. "And who's your father?"
"Haru!"
Sokka's eyes burst out of his head. Haru married Azula! He must have known who she was. What the hell was he thinking! When the woman never came to the door, Katara went to check the back.
"She's gone!"
Sure enough the backdoor was wide-open and little footprints made it to the gate where she must have jumped it while they were talking to the girl.
"Where does your father work?" Aang asked Rei.
"He works for the train company. I don't know where that is."
"We have to go now!" Katara told him.
"We can't just leave them alone."
"She did!"
"If someone found our son, you'd want them to make sure he was safe, not run off to something he found more pressing."
Aang insisted that they find Haru first or someone responsible to watch them.
The neighbor said that they could watch the little ones until Haru came home.
"How unusual? Mina never leaves her kids. Something must have happened. I hope she's okay."
"Actually she's …"
"Got sick but we think she'll pull through," Aang interrupted.
"Why did you lie to her?" Katara questioned when she left.
"If we tell everyone who she is, we might create a panic and the loyalists might find her first. We have to keep quiet. Plus, her kids have no idea. This isn't their fault."
"I can't believe she married Haru," Sokka said.
"It explains why he never comes to anything," Aang answered.
"Why would he do something so stupid?" Katara questioned.
"Maybe she changed," Aang offered.
"So she ran the first chance she got."
"We didn't exactly act like we were just visitors. She might have been scared."
"I'd never leave my kids. No matter what."
The first thing Azula did was find her husband.
"Mina, what's wrong?"
"They know. They're here."
"Who's here?"
"The Avatar and his friends. I can't go back to that asylum. I won't."
"Where are the kids?"
"They're probably at the neighbors. I doubt they left them alone."
"I'm going to find our kids and I'm going to fix this. I promise."
"Don't make promises you can't keep."
"I love you. Our kids love you. You deserve a second chance, and I'm not going to let them take it from you."
He kissed her passionately. Who knows when they would cross paths again?
She ran for it, carrying nothing but the duffel bag she hid in the kitchen in case she ever had to run. She hated being right. She really hated it right now.
"Where's Mom?" Hiro asked his sister.
"I don't know, but it must have been bad if she ran. Those people must have been bad news."
"But the bald man was so nice."
"Sometimes, nice people can be dangerous." Rei hugged her brother. "I hope they don't hurt her."
When Haru did make it home, he saw the house was empty and checked with the neighbor.
"There you are. I hope your wife gets better."
"Me too. She's at the hospital," he lied. "Rei, Hiro, it's time to go home!"
"Daddy!"
They jumped in his arms. "Where's Mommy?"
"She had to go away for a while, but I'm going to find her and we're going to work it all out okay."
"I can earthbend. I went to show mommy, but then those people came and she ran away."
Aang, Katara and Sokka asked all around for "Mina," but no one had seen her. When they got to Haru's job, his boss said, "oh, Mina was here."
"She was, when?"
"Like maybe two hours ago. She ran here, said something to her husband and then kept running. I don't know what she said, but I've never seen her like that. She's always so calm, but today, she was really freaked out."
"We should have found Haru first," Aang mumbled. "Thanks."
They went back to the house where Haru was hoping for some kind of sign. What do I do know?
The Avatar appeared. "Haru, are you home?"
The saddened earthbender let them in. "Hey."
"Your kids are …"
"Upstairs. I got them right away."
"I can't believe she just left them," Katara hissed.
"She told me where they were. They wouldn't have been alone long."
"Did you know who she was?" Sokka asked.
"Of course he knew. He's not stupid, well maybe he is. I have no idea," Katara hissed.
"It's not what you think."
"What happened Haru?"
"My father came out here to visit me. I moved here to get away from the city. I had a failed engagement and I just needed a break from it all. He found her, Mina, confused, hungry. She had no idea where she was. She didn't even have a name.
My father took her with him and when we met, she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. Her hair was down, her golden eyes sparkling like jewelry. We decided on the name Mina for her, and she got to work at the local hospice. She didn't even know she could bend because she didn't remember anything. I knew she was Fire Nation based on her looks, but I figured if she ran through the Forgetful Valley, she must have been running away from something bad and I figured it was best we don't find out what it was.
We fell in love, got married and conceived Rei all in the first year that we met. When the baby started fire kicking, the doctor said it was unusual that a nonbender was having a firebender with me and not an earthbender, but I didn't think anything of it. I mean you're a bender from two nonbonding parents (he said to Katara). Doctors never really know that stuff; they can only guess.
I think the pregnancy triggered something in Mina and she started to remember her past. First it was little memories like playing on a beach with her brother and going to some private school, but eventually, she realized she was Azula. She discovered her flame was blue and when she researched it, there was only one blue flamed firebender and she had vanished, around the time Mina had appeared.
She was scared that I would leave her or take our child or she'd go to jail, so she didn't tell me, but she realized that our child might also have a blue flame and then I'd know, so she told me everything. It never changed how I felt about her. I feared Azula during the war, but I love Mina now, and I thought Azula could just stay in the past.
Rei was born and she was healthy and happy, looking just like us. She could bend before she would eat solid food and of course, her flame was blue. We knew people would be suspicious eventually, but there wasn't any real evidence Mina was Azula, so we didn't worry about it.
Then, we had Hiro and he is an earthbender like me and if anyone thought that Mina was someone else, they didn't say anything.
Now, we're expecting our third child, and I was hoping we could just stay put. She hasn't done anything here."
Sokka couldn't believe it. His marriage fell apart and his son was growing up in a broken home, and Azula of all people was happily married with a gaggle of children. She had the life he wanted. It hardly seemed fair.
"Has she been in contact with anyone from the Fire Nation?"
"Agni no. She was afraid of what would happen if people found out who she was. She doesn't talk to anyone who's not from around here."
"They haven't tried to contact her?" Katara continued.
"No. She would have told me. Well, we would have moved and then she would have told me. Whatever's going on, we have nothing to do with it."
"Where is she?"
"She wouldn't tell me where she was going. She just said she had to lie low and figure it out. I begged her to stay, but she thought Zuko would lock her up the first chance he got and maybe take our unborn child.
"Wasn't she worried about Rei and Hiro?" Aang asked.
"Yes, but Rei is old enough to remember her parents, and Hiro can't take the throne because only firebenders can. Our baby might be a firebender and if Zuko took him or her now, then he could pass off the child as his and no one would be the wiser."
"They have a daughter."
"Can she firebend?"
"Not yet, but she's only four."
"Azula had no idea if he had kids or what their status was. She tried to avoid anything Fire Nation. I don't know what Zuko's all concerned about now, or why he sent you after six years of doing nothing, but my wife is a good woman and a good mother. She wouldn't do anything to risk their safety."
"Other than flee the town and leave them home alone."
"You were here. If you let anything happen to them that would speak more about you than her."
Katara scowled.
Hiro came downstairs. "When's Mommy coming home?"
"I don't know, sprout." He kissed his son on the forehead. "But I do know it's time to go to bed. Maybe she'll be home tomorrow."
Aang wrote to Zuko, sending an express message that they had found Azula, but she got scared and fled. She had married Haru and is pregnant, and he swears up and down that they aren't involved in any rebellion.
Zuko received the letter two days later and was displeased. "She is pregnant! What if it is a firebender?" She could be well posited to try and take the throne even if she hadn't been planning on it before. Now that he knew where to look, he decided to take matters into his own hands.
He called upon a new yet familiar villain, Combustion Man Jr. "I need you to find Azula and kill her." He gave a down payment of 500 coins. The rest would be paid at proof of death.
Azula had fled to Omashu. Hiding in the large city was quite easy. She only went out at night and only wore garments that were too large, covering her frame and as much as her face as she could without looking like a bandit. She missed her children. They were her life, but who knows what Zuko had in store. She could not risk it.
It had been over a week. She managed to get one letter to her husband. She knew they would be watching her mail, so she tried not to include any details that would reveal where she was.
Haru-
I wish I could come home to you and our children, but the one thing I learned about my old family is that none of them can be trusted, ever. If you follow your heart, I know we will be reunited once again.
Mina
Of course Aang read the letter before Haru got it, but it meant nothing to the Avatar.
"Why would she risk getting caught just to write something so cheesy?"
"Maybe it's a code," Sokka offered.
"We should wait and see what Haru does when he reads it."
Haru read it and frowned. "I have no idea what this means," he grumbled, but it must mean something.
While he struggled to figure out what the message meant, Azula started to travel to the place she was hoping Haru would find. After eating some bad chicken, she had to take a day off, resting at the hospital. She was about to leave when she saw a shadow.
Scared, she crawled under the bed.
"I know you're in here," the voice hissed.
Staring at the assailant's feet, Azula threw a fireball at them and hopped out the window. He gave chase, pursuing her down the empty streets and alleyways until he had her cornered. He had a bomb in his hands and he was ready to blow her up.
Azula was screwed. Even if she struck him with lightening now, the bomb would still detonate, likely killing her and her baby.
"Please don't do this."
"Do you really think begging will save you?"
"If not for me, then for my child. Can't you just kill me once she's born?"
"You expect me to believe you are pregnant." Women always say that. Men would say it if the could.
Azula lifted her shirt, a bump apparent.
"Agni you are pregnant." CBJ had killed a lot of people like his father before him, but the only thing his father ever said was don't kill a pregnant woman. It was the only rule in the hitman's code of ethics. No one likes a baby killer.
The man fled. Azula was relieved to be alive, but terrified to know that someone was actively trying to kill her. Zuko must really want me out of his way.
When Haru couldn't find any secret cyphers, he tried thinking of what would true to his heart mean. The only thing it could mean was going straight to her. She always has his heart.
Now where could she be?
He thought about places she might go: where they met, unlikely since another family moved into that home, where his father had found her, no, where they got married, in the courthouse, where they went for their honeymoon? He got it.
First, he went to Omashu with his kids, bringing them to his father. "Please take care of them until I come back," Haru said.
"Of course. You know I love these little sprouts."
"Where's Mina?"
"She got in trouble with her past. I have to go help her."
"May the spirits bless you."
Rei and Hiro were sad that their father wasn't bringing them too. "I miss Mommy!"
"I know," their grandfather told them. "But she has to take care of this first."
Aang and the others followed Haru to Omashu, but they lost him at his father's house.
"He left the kids too!" Katara grumbled.
"He must know where she is," Sokka said. "He went to go find his wife."
"Maybe he can get her to come back to Omashu," Aang said. "Maybe we should just wait here."
"They might be planning something." Katara insisted they try and find Haru and Azula. Haru said he'd tell them if he found anything, but of course he lied. As far as she was concerned, he was just as untrustworthy as the crazy princess.
It took Haru two days to get to the house on foot walking only at night, but when he got there, he knew in his heart his wife was waiting for him.
"Mina!" He called as he came into the door. He quickly got ambushed by two arms hugging him tightly.
"Haru!" She cried as he held her. "I'm so glad it's you."
"Our kids are with my father."
"I miss them so much."
"Me too. Let's go home."
"I can't."
"If we explain it all to Aang, I'm sure he can …"
"It's not just Aang, someone's trying to kill me."
"What?"
"I got sick and a hitman came to the hospital. He only spared me when he saw I was pregnant. The next hitman might not be so moralistic."
"A hitman?"
"Zuko really wants me out of the way."
"Are you sure it was him?" Haru had trouble believing his friend would do it.
"It could be Long Feng or Kuei or something, but Zuko's the only one who we know is looking for me. If we go back, the Avatar will tell him where I am, and whoever is trying to kill me will find me."
"What do we do?"
"I don't know."
Zuko waited for an update, just to hear that Haru had given them the slip too. He went to check in on his hit man just to see that the money had been returned.
"What is this?"
"I'm not going to kill a pregnant woman. I don't care who you are!"
"Is it a firebender?"
"I didn't ask."
Zuko threw lightening at the man, punishment for his insolence. He would need a new hit man, and he would need to make sure it looked like an accident.
Mai went to her husband's office that night. "Any news?"
"Other than Haru ditched them too. No."
"What is she trying to pull?"
"I don't know. I just hope Aang stops it in time."
After spending two nights together, Haru and Azula decided to go back to Omashu.
"They must have left by now," he reasoned. They got to their father's house that night, using the back entrance to avoid being spotted.
Azula went straight upstairs where she saw her sleeping son. "I love you Hiro. Don't you ever forget that." She kissed his sleeping forehead.
Next was Rei who woke up. "Mommy. I knew you'd come for us."
"Always. I love you so much."
"I love you too Mommy!"
Haru's father was happy to see that his son and daughter in law returned but was scared when he learned about the hit man.
"Why would her own family try to kill her?"
"I don't know if it was them, but Mina's pretty convinced. She doesn't think we should trust them."
"What are you going to do?"
"We don't know."
Sokka was tired. "We've searched all over the place. I miss my son. We don't know where they are, and maybe we should have just never come here."
Aang missed Bumi. "What do we do, say we tried, but they got away."
"This is ridiculous. Who knows what they are planning?"
"Who knows if they're planning anything? We only know that they got married, had kids and she ran. We haven't even come across any loyalists here. We should have started with them."
They wrote to Zuko telling him they were going back to the palace to regroup and be with their kids. The mission was at a standstill. "It's like they both vanished."
Zuko had to get this right this time. He had to make sure Azula was dead and gone. Zuko hired an expert to forge his sister's handwriting.
Dear Followers,
I was surprised to learn that there were still people supporting my bid for the crown. I gave up on that a long time ago, but if the spirits wish it, I will make my return.
I, however, refused to be apart of a failed coup, so I need to make sure that you have what you need to do to remove my brother. Currently, the Avatar and his friends are chasing me. If you can find a way to run interference so I can return to the Fire Nation, I would be most delighted.
Your Princess,
Azula
He showed it to Mai.
"I can't believe this. Actually, I can. Maybe we should have left her alone. Now she thinks she has something to fight for."
"I'm sure Haru will help us once he learns what she's really up to," Zuko said.
"I hope so. Love is blind."
Little did she know, how true those words were.
