Azula – The Prisoner
The Arrival of the Princess
Azula felt the deep headache and stupor lift and her vision came into soft focus.
She had expected to wind up in the top security Fire Nation asylum but this odd room looked comfortable with a large bed, neat white walls and a bank of wooden shelves that held books and various ornaments. A table had a strange lamp lit form the base with globs of red goo circulating in the thermal currents of a blue liquid. She had no idea how it worked and as a light it provided next to no light. She had no capacity for thinking in her drugged stupor.
A voice came from the room next door.
"Good Morning! Good Morning! Another wonderful day in the Village. The forecast predicts fine weather for the next week with only a small chance of showers. Now back to our program of music."
"I have gone over the edge." Azula sat up in her red night robes and rubbed her eyes as banal music filled the bedroom. She walked into the larger room and examined the wooden box that sat on a wooden shelf. It made the offending sounds that had rudely interrupted Azula's stupor.
Azula tried to fry the offending speaker with a fire bolt. Nothing at all happened.
The music played on.
Azula paced in the small room and nothing she could do made the music stop.
She took walk around the flat but she could could not figure out all of the strange things that furnished it. She refused to let the music relax her but she knew something was very wrong.
She shot another fire bolt at the annoying box that made noise.
Not a thing happened. The box droned on.
Azula walked into the larger room – a kitchen lay on one end and she saw a large living area with pleasant if strange furniture occupying the other end. She walked into the kitchen and found a small pamphlet on the black granite counter as if placed deliberately where she could find it. The kitchen had black varnished cabinets with stainless steel accents. She had a gas stove, a tea pot with the supplies in a wire rack next to it and an assortment of stainless steel appliances.
Welcome to Your New Home No. 9
Inside she found a map enigmatically labeled Your Village in a bland typeface.
"I know we have taken some liberties." A pleasant male voice announced from the speaker.
"Who are you?" Azula shot flame at the box but her efforts failed. "How can you hear me!?"
"I am your new Number 2."
"I am Azula – heir apparent to the throne of the Fire Lord." Azula snapped back.
"The New Number 9."
"I am not a number." Azula tried to summon all her energy to silence the rude wood paneled box.
"For official purposes everyone has a number. I am Number 2 – you are number 9."
"I am Princess Azula!" Azula yelled back.
"You are the New Number Nine." As the voice trailed off into more mundane music as a knock came at what Azula took to be her front door. A motorized hum followed and the door opened to reveal a late middle aged British man with white hair standing in the doorway. He wore a pleasant Fire Nation nobles clothes but unlike Azula's his were a somber black and gray but he wore a white scarf with red yellow and green strips to add a splash of color.
"Number 9 I presume?" The tall man announced. "I am Number 2. Shall I get straight to business? We have a few questions about your recent past."
"Get out." Azula sent out a lightning bolt but it never arrived on target. It never left her hand or even evinced any evidence of existing.
"Like I said." The pleasant looking British man cleared his throat. "We have a few questions about your recent past. We find ourselves in no hurry to answer them because you will not be going anywhere."
He walked away and the front door closed with a hum and a click.
* * *
"We have more proven methods." Katara said as Number 2 entered the strange room under the green dome that dominated the Village. She had a badge with a Penny Farthing bicycle on it and a number in black emblazoned over it – Number 18. "If you would grant me permission I could get the information you require from Number 9."
"She can't be conned." Number 2 spoke in his pleasant British accent. "We must win her over to our cause."
"She paces her room like a caged animal." Number 18 pointed to the video display projected over Number 2's desk. "She requires much more brutal methods before she reveals what she knows."
"She will test our defenses." Number 2 sat down in his round chair. "We have our orders and we must carry them out."
Azula paced her kitchen and inspected the contents of the cupboards. Generic canned goods labeled 'Village Foods' then a label with their contents – peas, beans and corn. All had that odd typeface and the bicycle logo. She threw a can at the speaker and it fell off the counter.
"We have an individual." Number 2 spoke softly. "Have you carried out your orders on Number 11?"
"He has proven a rich source of information." Number 18 replied calmly. "He proved a difficult nut to crack but as with all our more difficult cases I had to resort to more brutal methods."
"He is expendable." Number 2 replied as he watched Azula pace her kitchen.
The speaker box fell off the counter but did not cease its sounding. Azula trampled it but even as she smashed it and kicked the electronic boards around her living room the music only dimmed in volume – it did not cease.
"Electronics malfunction in Number 9's flat." The pleasant woman announced. "Electronics please report to Number 9's flat."
Azula heard a knock at the door.
"Electronics ma'am." A young man in a tan and black uniform tipped his hat. He had a number displayed as a badge and on his tan hat.
"How do you silence that thing!?" Azula demanded.
"You can't silence them." The man swept up the remains of the broken speaker box. "Villagers are not permitted to do so."
"Where is the Village?" Azula demanded once more.
The man walked out with the remains of the speaker box and returned with a new box.
"Be seeing you." With a knock on the box the music returned and the repairman left Azula's flat with an odd gesture she didn't understand.
"She will learn soon enough that she can never leave the Village." Number 2 spoke casually to Number 18.
* * *
Azula left her flat hoping to flee the never ending music and yet red boxes holding up speakers on poles in public spaces insured she never left earshot. She held out the map of the village in a vague hope of finding something out about her new home but the map revealed no secret escape routes. The midday sun beat down on her but the Village for all its attempts at looking ordinary appeared strange to her eyes. She could walk freely about the odd assortment of ivy covered wood and stone buildings and read all the signs but none of it made any real sense.
"Good afternoon Number 9." The pleasant male British voice announced.
"In the Green Dome." It answered itself. "Call it a business lunch."
Azula glanced around and found a tacky building with a green dome that looked like a French salon. She walked towards it for no other reason than it appeared as a landmark ruling the Village and unlike the villagers who ignored her as if she were transparent. She walked up a stone staircase and a pleasant looking dwarf butler with a balding head of black hair met her at the door. He wore the black formal uniform of the servant and like the villagers appeared to glance straight through her. Oddly enough he had no number.
"Good to see you." The voice resonated through the front foyer. "I trust you have made yourself at home?"
The white double doors with the plain looking brass Number Two on it buzzed as they slid open. Azula's mind refused to make sense of the room she saw beyond the doors. A strange round object that turned out to be a chair rose out of the floor and the same pleasant looking British man sat in a round cushioned void that seemed to have been scooped out of it.
"We have taken every measure to make you comfortable." Number 2 spoke loudly. "We have not inconvenienced you I trust?"
"I do not wish to stay here." Azula replied harshly. "I'm leaving."
"No one can leave the Village."
"You can't imprison the Princess of the Fire Nation!" Azula snapped as she stood in the doorway.
"Number 9 appears hostile." Number 2 spoke into a microphone. "She may yet prove of value to us so no harsh methods will be employed – yet."
"I am leaving." Azula stepped out from between the doors. "You won't keep me."
"Why did you fail?"
"In what?" Azula stepped forward and banged her fist on Number 2's desk upsetting a blue green telephone headset.
"I believe that you went insane but we must check all our opinions against the facts." Number 2 picked up the headset and placed it gently on the desk. "My opinions don't count."
"Be seeing you." Azula shouted sarcastically and pushed back from Number 2's desk.
"Stay and enjoy a light lunch." Number 2 gestured to a white melamine table that rose out of the floor. "Can't we have a pleasant conversation over lunch? We have your pertinent personal information on file. You enjoy tea and noodle soup I believe?"
Number 2 lifted the dome off a platter to reveal a hot cup of tea and a steaming bowl of Ramen type noodles.
"Of course we must make sure and have all the facts."
"I am not hungry." Azula walked out of the odd looking room.
"Be seeing you Number 9." Number 2 replied pleasantly.
"I am a person." Azula hissed as the double doors slid closed behind her. She stomped past the butler and walked out of the Green Dome a good deal more puzzled about her fate and a great deal more angry. She could see nothing beyond the Village but steep mountains with slopes covered in impenetrable temperate rain forest but as she knew from her experience at the Boiling Rock – any prison could be overcome – given enough time to probe its weaknesses.
* * *
"You new here?" An elderly gentleman asked Azula as she sat down at the Village cafe. On pleasant days the management set out tables for patrons to enjoy their meal in daylight. "Do you play chess?"
"Number 118?" Azula answered back to the man. The man wore robes like hers but green and Azula noted with some irritation that everyone dressed alike but in different colors. She could not for the life of her decode the color code but only she wore red.
A waitress brought out a marble chess board with the pieces set up.
"Of course." The elderly man ran his hand through his gray hair. "Number 9."
"How come you never left?" Azula asked.
"The pieces never leave the chessboard." The man replied. "You will come to like our Village."
"You open with a conventional move." Azula said sarcastically.
"We have everything here." The elderly man answered. "All your needs are met."
"I have no interest in becoming a pawn in this stupid chess match." Azula made her move on the chessboard. "I will take care of myself."
"The Citizen's Advice Bureau can help you." The elderly man made an annoyingly good move.
Be seeing you." Azula abruptly stood up and left. She walked across the open lawn toward a sign that read Town Hall. It looked important and she expected that like other town halls it had a staff in place to deal with the complaints of the citizens of the town.
Azula never made it to the front door. She knew the power of lightning but until that moment she had no impression of how cruel and agonizing lighting felt until she felt a bolt strike her as she stepped onto the stone lane that led to the Town Hall. As she passed under an archway she felt her body grow numb and felt a shocking pain.
"You can't go in." A pleasant elderly woman in green and black clothes advised Azula. "The Town Hall chooses who may go in."
"What if I wish to register a complaint?" Azula backed up and the pain vanished. "The Town Hall must deal with the concerns of the town."
"You must trust in those who govern us." The woman made an odd gesture. "Be seeing you."
Azula walked around the Village. She could hardly constrain her curious nature but despite a long afternoon spent hunting for a road out of the odd place not one path led out. Electric powered taxis rushed passed her and returned shortly after they went out of sight. Azula wandered off the road and into the forest taking care to keep out of sight. Large oak trees provided ample cover as she made her best effort to walk out of the Village. She half expected to find a fence or another odd force field to block her progress but instead she found only more forest, more oak trees and for some odd unfathomable reason – limestone busts of oddly plain looking middle aged men on Grecian fluted stone columns.
"Yellow Alert." The female voice announced over the Village public address system. "Yellow Alert."
Azula heard the distant announcement but paid it no heed. She would have laughed out loud at the white rubber eight foot tall balloon bouncing toward her through the trees in her direction had it not made a very creditable attempt at smothering her to death.
* * *
"Nasty scrape." Katara held Azula's hand as she checked her pulse.
"Katara?" Azula gasped. "What brings you here?"
You have mistaken me for someone?" Katara answered. "I am Number 18."
"Of course." Azula lay back. "And the bouncing rubber ball that tried to suffocate me is named Rover?"
"Yes." Number 18 answered back. The doctor looked feature for feature like Katara but wore the same uniform as everyone else but hers was black and blue. "You know you cannot leave the Village."
"Of course." Azula hissed.
"You will be discharged from the Hospital Number 9." Number 18 said authoritatively. "You have sustained no lasting damage. You had a close call so consider yourself lucky."
"My name is Princess Azula."
"We will put up with your eccentric ways only for a limited time Number 9. If you force our hands you will find we will prove more than willing to take harsher measures." Number 18 looked like Katara but had the sharp and cruel nature Azula had claimed for herself.
"I have seen your harsh measures."
"Only the tip of the iceberg." Number 18 answered back. "I have your Identity Card and Employment Card. For official purposes everybody has a number. You are Number 9."
"Keep them." Azula rose from the bed. "I know who I am."
"Be seeing you." Number 18 made an odd gesture as Azula walked past her and headed down the hall of the hospital.
"What the hell?" Azula muttered to herself as a male nurse with a patient tied to a hand truck rushed past her in the hallway. The patient had a metal mask over his face and was strapped down in light green blankets to the hand truck with bright red robes. The nurse wore the number 45 and the patient had the number 45b attached to his blanket along with the meaningless tag 'Operant Conditioning Trial'.
Bright daylight streamed through the windows of the old stone building designated as The Hospital. Azula walked past the duty nurse – a tired looking middle aged woman and into the mid afternoon sunshine. She had no clue how much time had passed. Had she lost a day? Had she only lost a few minutes? She had given up on answers to her many questions. Someone had pinned a circular name tag with the Number 9 and a Penny Farthing bicycle to her uniform. She casually took it off and tossed it into the grass of the Hospital lawn.
Azula walked down the road. If she had gone insane then the Village had an odd kind of coherence. She could have imagined any number of more pleasant delusions than a realm in which she could not fire bend and a realm in which she found herself among so many warders with such odd technology.
Certain of the fact that delusions fed on already existing fears she could not explain why having a number not a name bothered her. The Village gave rise to a new kind of helplessness and fear. She had an odd feeling they watched her and even if they did not monitor her every move she had no way of knowing when their attention was diverted.
"Your attention please!" That annoying feminine voice rang out over the loud speakers. Whether announcing a death or the local weather forecast the tone of the voice never altered. Azula wondered if they even bothered to announce deaths in such a place. "The local shop has a variety of musical selections on sale for your enjoyment."
Questions are a burden to others; answers are a prison for oneself. A friendly looking sign in the Village typeface hung in the window of the Shop. Azula found this a disturbing sentiment as she entered the shop.
* * *
"A still tongue makes for a happy life." Number 2 muttered to himself as he watched Azula pace her apartment. He sipped his tea as he watched the video projected on the wall. " But we must find a way of loosening your tongue Number 9."
The record player had the same wooden finish as the speaker, a hinged top that opened to reveal a turntable, an On and Off volume control and the tone arm. It sat on a shelf in her main room and bore no manufacturer's or model label. The record player did not always work. Azula had figured out how to operate it even if she had no clear understanding of the principles upon which its function was based. It proved a simple enough device to operate – place the disk on the turntable - the needle on the record and turn it on. Somehow the black disks made sound in some manner she did not fully understand but then again most of the things she saw in the Village worked on principles she didn't fully understand. She could not determine any fault with the machine itself but it didn't always work.
Azula had purchased some recordings of Berlioz to try and make some attempt to dull the ever present music and crowd out the Village Voice with something loud and orchestral. Judging by the record jacket, Berlioz promised to perform the duty nicely. Like so many other things in the Village; the record player had someone else controlling it and it would stop mid record to allow the Village Voice to announce the weather or some other mundane announcement. Once the announcement was over the recording resumed playing. Even the door to her ground level flat locked promptly after the curfew had passed and unlocked in the morning. Azula found even this a slight as it made her feel she had no control – they controlled her every move.
She paced back and forth listening to the music over the speaker.
She had given up on using Berlioz to drown out the music. She didn't really find Berlioz to her liking anyhow.
The Village had a Labor Exchange but Azula had no desire to work for the Village. Even without any gainful employment the Village met her needs. She had a card which had work units and she always had work units to spend in spite of her chronic unemployment. She lived unhappily in what appeared to be one happy collective. She sat in the flat and clenched her fists but did not assault the speaker.
The phone rang but Azula didn't answer.
Answering the beck and call of Number 2 would be caving in.
Katara or Number 18 and four male nurses walked straight into her apartment.
"Number 2 requests a meeting." Number 18 read from a clipboard in her left hand and held a menacing looking hypodermic needle in her right. Whoever ran the village proved awfully good at intimidation and even if the needle served as a prop it proved very effective. Azula decided to not test Number 18's patience. "And I have instructions to sedate you if you refuse to come with me to the Green Dome."
Azula nodded and obligingly followed Number 18 out to a waiting golf cart like vehicle laughingly called a taxi and climbed in the passenger side. The four burly nurses climbed in the open back of the cab and Number 18 drove off.
"Any idea what Number 2 wants?" Azula asked as the taxi rolled through the Village.
"I follow orders." Number 18 answered.
"You must settle down Number 9." Number 2 sat in his strange round chair twirling a folded colored umbrella in his right hand. "We offer employment. Someone with your talents would find ready employment with us."
"My doctor made much the same recommendation." Azula glared at Number 18.
"You can have a long happy life here." Number 2 said coyly.
"As a number."
"Of course." Number 2 answered back. "We all have a number."
"Where am I?" Azula asked angrily.
"In the Village."
"What do you want from me?" Azula raised her voice.
"We want information." Number 2 dryly replied.
"Whose side are you on?"
"That would be telling." Number 2 did not raise his voice. "We want information … information."
"You won't get it." Azula sorely wished she could summon her fire bending but she knew she had lost her powers.
"By hook or by crook we will."
"Who are you?" Azula shouted back.
"I am Number 2."
"Who is Number 1?" Azula asked the next logical question.
"You are Number 9."
"I am a person, not a number." Azula turned her back to Number 2 and made for the door. Of course the door didn't open for her until Number 2 reached for a button on his curved desk with the end of the umbrella.
Azula didn't understand any of the technology or magic Number 2 had at his disposal. She knew enough to know she would not get an explanation.
* * *
"She doesn't wear her number." The bald headed man known simply as the Supervisor stared out from his wire framed glasses. "How long are we to put up with her anti social habits? If she refuses to wear her number it makes tracking her more work for us and we have limited resources."
"She turns every action into a gesture of defiance." Number 2 said admiringly as he watched the surveillance video stream from her apartment projected onto the large curving wall of the inner walls of the Green Dome. "She has not attempted to escape but only because she has not yet made sense of this place."
"The advantage of the Village." The Supervisor said calmly. "Hard to escape from a prison when you can't see the walls."
"You will notify me as soon as she plants a bomb?" Number 2 tapped his umbrella as he watched Azula leave her apartment.
The band played in the lawn in front of the public rostrum. Azula found their playing as banal as the music directed at the villagers through the public address system. She had not met any villagers who wore red clothing – she took some measure in the fact she stood out by the color of her clothing. She had no real purpose for her walk but she made her way to the Village bell tower. She made time to look out to the sea in spite of the fact she never saw anything out to sea.
"Enjoying your morning my dear?" Number 2 stood at the bottom of the stairs leading to the bell tower. "Every morning when the band begins to play you make your way to the bell tower. I don't suppose you could explain this eccentric behavior?"
"I see you decided to join me." Azula walked by Number 2 and he followed.
"I take an active interest in the lives of all the villagers." Number 2 answered. "If I didn't I could not function as their benevolent leader."
"If I committed a crime why haven't I heard the charges against me?" Azula snapped.
"Why did you fail as leader of the Fire Nation and Fire Lord?"
"How did these people end up here?" Azula climbed to the top of the stairs of the bell tower.
"They stay by choice." Number 2 gave an opaque reply. "You come here every day and stare out to sea. Why?"
"Perhaps I want to see signs of life out there." Azula saw nothing out to sea except for the unending expanse of cloudy sky.
"There is nothing out there." Number 2 stood next to Azula. "Not for you anyway."
"And if I see a light – a ship perhaps?" Azula said softly.
"Deluded imaginings of a deranged mind?" Number 2 tapped his umbrella on the stone floor of the bell tower balcony. "You wish to be labeled insane?"
"Did my brother have me sent here?" Azula stared out to sea.
"To this place?" Number 2 laughed derisively. "Fire Lord Zuko would have to know this place existed!"
"I see." Azula's voice trailed off.
"You are … " Number 2 began quietly. "You are the nameless dead, among the uncounted victims. You have had your face – no your identity stolen – where do you think such people wound up? You have vanished from your realm and have no other place to other than here in the Village."
"I can't use my fire bending." Azula said.
"Of course not." Number 2 sneered. "We have rules. Bending is a privilege not a right and one you must earn."
A small helicopter landed on the neatly groomed grass landing pad below the bell tower. Azula had seen these odd machines fly into and out of the Village but she had no idea where they came from.
"If you will excuse me my dear." Number 2 stood back. "I have to greet some important dignitaries."
"Visitors?" Azula took her chance to sneer. "In this place?"
"I leave you to gaze out to nowhere." Number 2 began to descend the stairs.
Two middle aged tall men wearing black climbed out of the helicopter.
She had no doubt the helicopter had some kind of security detail even though she could see no one guarding it. She walked slowly down the stairs of the bell tower and she could see the huge balloon like Rover stalking her as she walked by. Somehow it seemed to know of her presence.
"You can give up on using the helicopter to escape." Azula jumped back when she heard the voice of Toph.
"I recognize you." Azula spoke quietly. Toph wore the same uniform as Azula but in black and green. "Toph? The blind earth bending girl?"
"I am blind." Toph replied. "I grew up here."
"Toph?" Azula furrowed her eyebrows in frustrated confusion.
"Number 24." Toph answered. "I have a number."
If color signaled some manner of caste system Azula could make no sense of Toph - a teenage girl who wore green. Number 18 – Katara's double wore blue and black. Number 2 wore gray and black but so did the Butler who served him and as did the shop keeper. She had seen a wide range of people wearing green – elderly men and women and now Toph. If the colors of people's clothing had a pattern she could not yet make it out.
"Very well." Azula disliked the Toph from her realm. "I can't fly one of those machines on any account."
"They don't let us get close." Toph's body double answered back. "Rover guards it."
"You grew up here?" Azula asked. "You have parents."
"Yep." Number 24 clapped her hands together.
"How did they come to be here?"
"We don't discuss it." Number 24 looked at the pretty princess and spoke as if she accepted the Village's arbitrary rules as a pleasant fact of life. "It's a rule."
"Didn't you ever ask?"
"You know what they say about questions." Number 24 laughed. "You will come to accept the Rules."
"Has anyone ever escaped?"
"No." Number 24 chirped. "Some tried and some died."
"But where do the helicopters come from?"
"I don't know." Number 24 looked at the ground.
"And the food and the things we buy?" Azula had hoped Toph's double could answer some of her burdensome questions but Number 24 gave her only opaque answers. "Where does that come from?"
"I don't know." Number 24 answered back. "They would let us know if we needed to know. We don't need to know so they don't tell us."
As the Princess such an answer would have infuriated Azula but she had no bending and no ability to enforce her rage so she let it slide. She glanced across the lawn and took a look at the idle helicopter.
* * *
"No prison is escape proof." Azula muttered to herself as the lights went out all over the Village except for those few left on in the Hospital and the street lights. Curfew had come and passed and she had not returned to her apartment. Her minders knew she had not returned but her observers wished to indulge her curious nature to study her behavior. Toph's body double had made it clear nobody could up and leave the Village but Azula had decided not to believe her – resistance was not futile.
Whoo! Whoo! An owl called out and broke the eerie silence of the Village at night. She had concluded from the temperate vegetation – the trees in the forest and the flowers that colored window boxes around the Village that she had not remained in the Fire Nation: the plants were all the wrong type best suited to a cooler and wetter climate. Of course she didn't know if somehow her minders could control weather as well as people.
"Our royal denizen has stayed up past her appointed bedtime." Number 2 saw Azula sneaking along the back alley behind a row of flats as the night vision cameras tracked her.
"You can't let her do as she likes!" Number 18 protested. "She has proven anti social tendencies."
"I don't see any evidence of a gun on her person." Number 2 watched the ugly frog green night vision video feed and twirled his umbrella. "Our failures instruct us at least as much as our successes perhaps more. Our princess believes she can escape the Village. She has to learn escape is impossible even for her. We can't explain it to her – she has to find out by her experiences."
"I would prefer to use more direct methods to find out what we need to know." Number 18 stood at Number 2's desk.
"She matters a good deal to us and while your methods prove valuable they also can prove brutal. I have it from the highest authority that Number 9 is not to be damaged – she must willingly join us." Number 2 leaned forward and picked up the yellow cordless telephone on his desk. "Go to orange alert."
Azula saw Rover rushing toward her as she ran through the forest at the edge of the village. Rover moved with astonishing speed but never reached her. She felt a jolt and passed out against a larch tree.
"She has begun to learn escape is not possible." Number 2 leaned back.
"Have you any further orders for Number 11?" Number 18 asked.
"You may proceed as you see fit." Number 2 said cruelly. "He is a rather unimportant case for us and further study won't prove fruitful."
Azula woke up the next morning in her apartment with a headache.
The phone rang and she answered it.
"As you can see Number 9." The familiar voice of Number 2 came over the line. "No one leaves the Village. Be seeing you."
* * *
"I knew I would find you here." Number 18 shouted from the stairway of the bell tower. "You don't strike me as a noble soul so what do you think about when you come up here?"
"As my doctor you have all the information on file." Azula did not turn to greet the good doctor.
"We have detailed records but no file is ever fully complete." Number 18 leaned back against the wall of the bell tower. "I heard you attempted an escape last night."
"Is that in my file?" Azula smelled the sea air.
"We indulge our new denizens only for a limited time." Number 18 said. "After then we start taking measures."
"The first attempt fails and you die on the second?" Azula sneered.
"You have got it surrounded." Number 18 struck Azula as a perfect twin for Katara but with a determined evil even beyond Azula's venomous strain of evil. "You won't try to escape using that method."
"You have a very large graveyard for a village of a few hundred." Azula watched a funeral procession of six men toting a wooden coffin along the beach toward the graveyard.
"Did you know Number 11?" Number 18 asked politely. "He passed away last night."
"Of natural causes no doubt?" Azula watched the grim activities taking place in the graveyard.
"His record will read that way." Number 18 assured Azula.
"I have met Number 2." Azula decided to fish for information. "Who is Number 1?"
"You are Number 9." Number 18 said with a certain harshness. "You should wear your number – it's a rule."
"I don't recall anyone telling me the Rules." Azula had to admit the Village did look pretty in the morning sunshine with the odd mix of classical and baroque buildings it had the feel of an Italian villa or alpine spa resort to it.
"You have all the information about the Village you require." Number 18 began to descend the stairs. Azula followed after her still hoping to find out more information but Number 18 appeared to have mastered the art of dodging the question. "Any more would be telling."
"You want information?" Azula followed behind Number 18. "Is that why you have followed me?"
"I want to care for the residents under my care as Village physician." Number 18 walked into the place known as the General Store. "That includes your physical and mental well being."
"How philanthropic." Azula looked at a display of post cards which all had color pictures of the Village. She found this ironic in a sad way. "And was Number 11 your patient?"
"Of course." Number 18 bought a notebook and a pen.
"Thinking of sending a friend a postcard?" Number 18 watched Azula leaf through the postcards on display.
"And it will find its way to her?" Azula flipped over a postcard with a picture of the bell tower.
"No." Number 18 answered bluntly. "Any attempt to send messages out gets promptly shut down."
The shopkeeper held out a punch and punched a hole in a paper card Number 18 held out. He had a polite face that vaguely reminded Azula of Uncle Iroh.
"Be seeing you." Number 18 took back her paper card and then walked out of the store.
Azula produced her paper card and purchased the postcard with the picture of the bell tower on it.
"That will be two work units." The shopkeeper politely took her card and punched it. "Be seeing you."
"You my guard?" Toph's double met Azula as she left the store.
"Of a sort." Number 24 answered back happily. "We look after each other."
"As loyal citizens of the collective." Azula pointed her finger in the air in a finely tuned gesture of general disdain.
"Yes." Number 24 smiled. "You know any other way?"
"A boat?" Azula watched two men leave in a silver and black sinister looking high speed powerboat.
"Daily patrols to protect the village." Number 24 added helpfully.
* * *
"Azula has settled down in recent days." Number 2 spoke to the Supervisor in the Control Room where the warders watched their charges. "According to your report she has cultivated a friendship with Number 24?"
"Yes indeed." The Supervisor held the responsibility for surveillance in the Village. "I have made my report as complete as possible."
Two men sat on a see saw type apparatus of shining metal that turned slowly around in a circle. They watched the entire Village and selected the cameras for closer observation. The villagers knew they were constantly watched as the Control Room made no secret of that fact since it made people easier to control if they knew of the Observers. At least the Control Room tried to hold up the myth that they could see everything. On the center monitor over the Control Room Number 2 and the Supervisor watched Azula and Number 24 talking at a table outside of the cafe.
"She has no intentions of making friends." Number 2 could not overhear the conversation at the moment although he would soon have Control rectify that. He had no doubt Azula had settled down in order to observe the Village to gain more information. Number 2 knew Number 24 would prove of little value to her in any escape plans. Number 24 had grown up in the Village and had no concept of the world at large and no desire to leave. Number 2 held the Supervisor's report in his right hand and tapped the palm of his left hand with it as he thought to himself.
"Number 24 would notify us if Number 9 had spoken of any intentions to attempt an escape." Number 2 spoke to no one in particular. "But that woman is not a fool. She doesn't yet believe escape is impossible. Perhaps we should stage another lesson?"
"Of course." The Supervisor spoke as if receiving an order.
"I think since she has taken a liking to our wonderful sea view an escape by water might prove tempting." Number 2 turned to the Supervisor. "I trust I can leave it in your hands? Please have a plan fully ready by this evening."
"Of course." The Supervisor emphatically answered.
"Number 9 has a clever side so we must make sure she doesn't suspect a set up." Number 2 turned around and left the Control Room. As the metal electric doors slid open Number 2 turned around and spoke to the Supervisor once again. "Make certain to set up audio surveillance at the tables of the cafe. I trust Number 24 but Number 9 has a subtle and scheming nature and our young Number 24 might prove naïve or compliant."
* * *
"You have watched the boat for two hours." Number 24 looked at Number 9. "You have not touched your tea."
"I have never seen that sailing ship before." Azula noticed a small schooner docked at the Village docks at the seashore. Four guards stood on the dock and protected it but the Villagers ignored it and went about their business.
"That ship comes in every two weeks." Number 24 clanged her tea cup against the saucer. "I heard the crew shouting as they were pulling up to the dock. It stays for a day or two and leaves."
Azula knew how to sail a ship. Her experience in the Fire Nation navy imparted some skill. She decided on a gamble. She knew the Village could protect valuable assets in any number of ways – Rover, force fields and doors that refused to allow passage. Rover appeared nowhere in evidence and Azula thought it a safe bet that the Village masters would not deploy guards if they had a more certain means of securing the ship. The boat looked quite low tech compared to the helicopters or the various taxis and carts or the odd video system in Number 2's dome. It had white sails, a wooden hull painted white on top and black below the gunwales and a small pilot cabin above decks but bore not flags of registry or evidence of a name.
"Do you know where that ship goes?" Azula asked Number 24.
"I don't." Number 24 replied infuriatingly. "I have very acute hearing because of my blindness. I can tell when most people lie. If someone attempted to misinform me I would soon grow to suspect it so in my case no one tells me the answers to things I do not need to know. I may pick up on deception but not lies of omission."
Azula made a careful note of this fact. Azula had no problem manipulating the young Number 24 into an escape but Number 24 had no desire to escape 'out there'. Number 24 had no knowledge anything existed beyond the Village and her elders had so conned her she didn't believe such knowledge had any use. Azula would have to leave on her own.
Number 2 strolled across the lawn toting his colorful umbrella in spite of the fact it was a warm sunny day. He approached the white patio table where Number 24 and Number 9 sat and he smiled in a pleasant greeting.
"I think your parents want you to return home Number 24." Number 2 spoke kindly. "You have your studies to attend to."
"Be seeing you." Number 24 stood up then walked away quickly.
"You have settled down?" Number 2 sat down across from the table. "Perhaps become somewhat fond of our little Village?"
"I do not approve of the musical selections over the public address system." Azula leaned back and crossed her arms defiantly.
"You may feel free to make any recommendations to the Entertainment Subcommittee." Number 2 answered back in a matter of fact way. "They will give due attention to any reasonable request."
"Maybe I can get them to shut off the music altogether." Azula's amber eyes burned with venal hate but her voice remained calm.
"The Black Widow is in port today." Number 2 said blandly as a waitress brought a cup of tea with a slice of lemon. "She is a fine ship."
"Where does she hail from." Azula sneered.
"No place you need to know about."
"Does she bring in new villagers?" Azula looked at Number 2 hoping to find a sign of irritation under that pleasant demeanor.
"She brings in what we need." Number 2 sipped his tea. "Now let us discuss your proper integration into the Village. You have not visited the Labor Exchange and I think a day job might help you become part of our Village."
"I have a title – Princess Azula of the Fire Nation. I had a job – defend my nation's interest." Azula could feel rage welling up within her.
"And yet you failed at your duties." Number 2 said calmly. "We must know why. Your failure had implications for the War and the world you knew. I believe that you broke down under the stress but it does not matter what I think. Others want evidence that proves this beyond a reasonable doubt and perhaps even a degree beyond."
"You have Number 18's medical expertise." Azula tapped the table impatiently.
"She could supply some of the information we require." Number 2 nodded. "Her methods prove at times extreme and we could not guarantee you would retain all your faculties."
Azula said nothing and remained sitting as Number 2 stood up.
"Think about what I have said." Number 2 made a circle around his right eye. "Be seeing you."
To be continued ...