TRAPPED IN THE MEMORIES OF OUR PAST
CHAPTER THREE: SOKKA AND KATAR
Thanks for all the great reviews, special thanks to DemonPie17, KittyKatly, Avatarspiriaangkorra, Avatar4ever, Squibble the whovianbreadstick, why should I tell you my name, OntheRun246, annelise311, and everyone for reviewing, it means a gazillion to me.
I used to have the story written up to the fifth chapter and halfway through the six, but as luck would always have it for me, not that I believe in luck, some error occurred and the whole thing was deleted so I had to start up again from scratch so I forgot to mention a few thing so sorry.
However, I got people saying that the story was over emotional, and they are right, and it should be actually at least the characters, the problem is that you don't wait, like me of course, and I also keep forgetting to tell you, it should've been in the past chapter or at least mentioned in an author note, the thing is...
You know what? You'll just know from this chapter, it's all about it, easy enough.
So one way to find out, it's called reading so do it.
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Iroh stood rooted to his spot.
His brows were furrowed as beads of sweat rolled down his face.
The fog is doing something to me, he thought, the memory of his wife was one that he hated, a kind of memories that made him cry, but not experience the pain he had been experiencing during the whole flashback.
It often made his heart ache, like the memory of losing Lu Ten in the Siege of Ba Sing Se, but in the flashback it made his heart and mind ache, he felt as if he was stabbed repeatedly by swords made of Agni's own flame, he felt as if he wanted to scream till his throat tore apart.
The old Dragon of the West couldn't really explain the feeling, like his mind was on fire, or like his heart was chopped to millions of little pieces then burned, something like that, so strange and foreign yet so painful.
His golden amber eyes switched their gaze to his nephew who was lying on the ground unconscious bleeding from several spots.
He ran to his side.
"Zuko? Zuko? Nephew? Are you alright? Wake up!"
No answer, he placed his fingers on his nephew's bloody neck, good his heart was beating, better unconscious than dead.
The gaang were even more stunned, they found themselves over emotional and so not their usual selves save Aang and Katara, just a little.
The sense changed again, and they found themselves in front of an igloo, snow was everywhere, everything seemed perfect.
Tears rolled down the two water tribe teenager's cheeks upon releasing that they were home once again.
Sokka felt the salty liquid known as tears roll down his cheek, with his finger he wiped it and then stared at the liquid dripping off his finger and into the snow slowly.
He was... Crying?
Iroh gave up on trying waking his nephew, instead he set him down on an edge of an igloo, strangely he didn't go through it, and then he turned to the other kids standing and watching the scenery around them sceptically.
Sokka looked once again at the few tear drops still going down his cheek and into the snow.
Why am I crying? He thought to himself, he was a guy, a warrior, and warriors don't cry in public, for record they don't cry at all!
And he was a warrior, the strongest, and most awesome, most cunning, most handsome( He had more on his mind but I'm not wasting the chapter on that.) warrior.
P.A.D (Public affection display.) was not one of his habits and is not going to be.
That sounded like Katara, not Sokka.
The warrior tried to stop crying only to cry more.
He tried and tried, until he was whimpering and sobbing, he kicked the snow with his feat.
Everyone stared at him.
Speaking of everyone...
They were all facing the same problem, Toph didn't cry, it was weakness and she was... Toph, Aang and Katara were often emotional, but everything has a limit.
The kids looked at Iroh wishing for an answer.
He felt somehow embarrassed that they saw him suffer like that, or that they saw his wife die, or anything of his past, back when he was a different man, but he chose to ignore it.
"Iroh, what's going on?"
He recalled once hearing about such a thing, such kind of fog was created by spirits that loathed humans and wished for their torture, the spirits used their powers to create a power that would make them suffer before finishing them off, and that would get stronger and stronger by their death, so the spirits created the fog of memory, a kind of spirit guarded it, he got stronger over the pains of people's past and how much did it affect them.
The fog itself was so powerful, it made the people exposed to it suffer, it messed with their emotions.
But that was impossible, was it not? It was just one of the stories his mother told him to get him to sleep when he was younger, it was just a story to enrich kid's imagination, to entertain them no more, could it possibly be even true?
"Iroh we are still waiting you know."
He snapped back to reality.
"It's the fog."
"The what now?"
"The fog that was surrounding us, it made us like this, it messes with our emotions."
"I still don't understand." Sokka said.
"It affects your emotions, so you would become the way you are now, it makes it easier to finish you this way, with all your emotions flowing the way they are it's easier to destroy you."
Their jaws dropped as they stared wide eyed at the retired general.
Now they understood.
It was like when some people get caught in over drama or an emotional situation they would pass out for some time. This was the same, the fog turns them over emotional than they are(They are not emotional.) So they collapse and lose their minds faster, it was creepy, but it was the only reasonable explanation.
They didn't have more time to process as the sielence of the flashback faded away and was replaced by a young child's voice.
Katara and Sokka came to view, only that they were nine and eight no more.
"Katara but I'm still hungry!" Nine year old Sokka complained waving his hands in the air.
"Then eat snow." Eight year old Katara joked.
However the young Sokka didn't know that his younger sister was joking, he bent down, collected some snow in his gloves, and then shoved them to his mouth tasting them.
"Snow is cold Katara!" He complained again but chewed the snow anyway.
Young Katara giggled.
Her brother had such an appetite, he wouldn't mind eating their village's storage room if mom allowed him.
The duo kept walking, until they stopped smelling something.
It was snowing, not the usual white pure snow, no black smelly snow.
"Fire nation!" Young Sokka yelled.
"Katara you go tell mom, I'll try to find dad! Hurry!"
Young Katara nodded and then started running with full speed alongside her brother.
Katara and Sokka looked at each other; they gave each other looks that only a brother and sister were able to understand, concern and fear was clear on both of their faces.
Aang and Toph stared at their friends; they looked like Iroh minutes earlier, which meant...
Toph ran to Sokka while Aang ran to Katara, they shook them rather violently.
"Guys ignore it!"
"Twinkle Toes is right! Like Iroh said this fog thing affects your emotion and makes the memory stick out even worse! Ignore it! Do something you can't..." She trailed off before saying the word.
Even the mighty Toph feared to say it to either of them.
Aang and Toph shook them even stronger but the water tribe siblings were rooted to their spot, just staring at their younger selves run through the village while people screamed and ran different directions trying to protect their kids and their selves.
Iroh lowered his head in shame, his country was such a disease, killing, attacking, destroying, scarring...
He will regret it later, but now he was busier.
Iroh stared from at the siblings, the story was true, he now believed it after he saw it affect the two like this, and he needed to do something.
Couldn't he do like his nephew did? Think Iroh think!
What did Zuko do? He somehow managed to change the "disturbing" to a one much happier and less depressing.
He tried to remember what he read in that story book.
Toph and Aang tried to at least talk to their friends but all their tries winded up in filature.
"No, no, children, your friends are mine now!" The voice of the fog was back, laughing an evil laugh, red fog that came out of nowhere circled them, it formed a hand and pushed Toph and Aang back much like it did to Zuko, then it surrounded Sokka and Katara exactly like it did to Iroh.
Toph jumped to her feet straightaway and ran to the place where the fog was.
"If you're so tough why don't you get down here so that I can show you who we really are!" She threatened.
The fog grew an arm once again and threw her far away near Zuko's side,
"Foolish child."
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Zuko didn't know where he was, he just woke up to find himself staring up at what looked like a golden sky.
He slowly helped himself up to a sitting position and rubbed his newly short hair.
He remained on that position for a few minutes before he got up and decided to figure out where was he.
The fire bender was feeling very strange and foreign in the back of his head but he just ignored it as usual.
He wandered around the thick trees failing to remember what happened or why was he here, a small clearing came to view in it was a rock and a monkey in robes was there meditating.
I have finally gone crazy, Zuko thought.
But he walked over to the monkey anyway.
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Aang helped Toph to her feet; their friends were clearly not doing so well.
Tears were still rolling down their faces.
Eight years old Katara was out of breath but she finally reached their small igloo tent( whatever was it).
She wanted to run inside to warn her mother, but someone had already entered, it was a man, he wore all red cloths and a black mask.
Katara ran after him, she saw him in front of her mother who said nothing, her mother motioned her to go, tears blinded her vision.
The present Katara felt sharp pain cross her heart and mind, she felt herself weaken slowly, a scream of anguish and hurt tore from her throat.
Her brother was better, he was crying at seeing his mother but nothing that special.
"Katara! Katara what's going on?!" Aang yelled as he uselessly tried to stop her yells.
Iroh stared at the kids in front of him, they needed help, he looked at his nephew one last time and then ran to them.
Be safe nephew, he thought.
Everyone could hear whatever was in the fog laugh and scream more and more.
"Iroh! What's going on with the two of them?!" Toph yelled as soon as Iroh reached them.
"The affect of the fog!"
They stayed silent.
The sense switched to Sokka running where some men with weapons, Sokka ran around them until he found his father,
"Dad! The Fire Nation!"
Hakoda placed his hand on his son's shoulder and gave it a light squeeze.
"Sokka I know, go back to your mother and sister, everything will be fine."
Little Sokka hesitated but then nodded upon seeing the reassuring smile his father gave him, the little warrior started running again.
A scream filled with pure angst and pain erupted from the throat of the present Sokka without an alert causing Toph, Aang, and Iroh to wince in a mixture of surprise and pain.
Sokka didn't know what was going on; his tongue was no longer his property, instead of a single tear rolling down his face after seeing his father for all those tears unbearable pain shot at his chest and head, he filled as if somebody was stabbing him over and over again with the sharpest most poisoned sword over and over again without even giving him a break to take a breath, he know understood how did Iroh feel previously.
"Iroh what are we going to do?! Seriously!" Aang and Toph yelled in unison but they were way too concerned about their friends to actually notice.
Iroh and for the first time of his life didn't know what to say, he was speechless, he had no idea about what to do; about his next move, the old Dragon of the West usually always had a plan but not this time,
"I-I don't know."
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"Um... Excuse me? But where exactly am I?" Zuko asked knowing that he sounded so stupid and honourless unlike his usual self, but it was his first time talking to a dressed monkey who was meditating in the middle of Agni-knows-where, so he was sure that he was excused.
The monkey opened up one eye, but kept its meditative position,
"Can you not see that I am meditating boy?" It said clearly irritated.
Zuko didn't really know what to say, he said the first thing that came to his mind,
"You can talk?"
"Yes I can! Now leave me ALONE!" The monkey yelled with a voice filled with different kinds of emotion.
"JUST TELL ME WHERE AM I!" Zuko yelled back at him clearly losing his temper.
Before the two of them could get to further conflicts, Zuko felt a hand squeezing his shoulder.
He turned around to find a tall old man with a long white beard and fire nation clothing.
"He has not always been the most friendly you know."
Zuko recognized this man from the Winter Solstice, he was Avatar Roku; the avatar before Aang.
"Avatar Roku?"
"Yes my boy, I believe it is about the time we talked my great grandchild."
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"What do you mean you don't know?!"
"I..."
"We can't just leave them to die can we?"
"We will not, I wish I knew what my nephew did."
Iroh tried to remember what he read but he unfortunately couldn't, the three benders ran towards their friends trying to wordlessly wake them up and destroy the fog's affect.
All they didn't know was that the big hit has yet to come.
Kya was still trying to get her daughter out of the tent; unfortunately the man noticed her movements and turned around only to capture young Katara.
"Never mind her." Kya said in a mix of fear, concern, and nervousness.
"Is she your daughter?"
No answer.
"Tell me who is last water bender here and I will let her go."
"I am, now let her go."
The man let go of the girl,
"Go find your father Katara."
Katara and Sokka screamed more and more, while the others tried to find a solution and soothe them.
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"What do you mean by great grandchild?" Zuko said.
As if it wasn't enough to be stuck here he had to meet the past Avatar.
"Can you not understand that I am trying to meditate here?!" The monkey yelled again.
Before Zuko could respond or give him a piece of his mind Roku placed a hand on his shoulder,
"Let's go speak somewhere else shall we?"
Zuko nodded dumbly and followed the ex-avatar through the trees.
They came to another clearing where a red dragon stood.
Roku walked over to it, he petted it, and then turned to Zuko who stood watching.
"This is Fang, my dragon."
Zuko nodded once again and walked over to Fang, he never saw a real live dragon before, as he heard the last was killed by his Uncle years before he was born.
He sat behind Roku as the dragon took off.
"What you said about me being your great grandchild is it true?"
"Of course it is."
"But fire lord Sozin is my great grandfather not you."
"Fire lord Sozin was your father's grandfather; I am your mother's."
Zuko stayed silent, that sounded strange, but he dropped the subject for now, he had more important things to worry about.
"Where exactly am I?" He asked after sometime unsure of what to really say.
"The spirit world Zuko."
Great, he just kept silent for the rest of the flight.
After some minutes they landed on an island, Zuko recognized it immediately.
"But how? I saw you destroy this place!"
"I destroyed the materialist form of the place in your world."
"Yeah, that makes a lot of sense..." Zuko mumbled under his breath.
The fire bender followed Roku around the temple until they were in the main hall or something.
Roku stopped walking so did Zuko,
"Why exactly am I here? Am I like...Dead?"
It was known that only the avatar or the dead people could enter the spirit world, so he must be dead, or crazy.
"Because Zuko, it is the time you choose your destiny."
"Y-you sound like Uncle."
Roku smiled for a brief moment.
"What do you mean by chose my destiny?"
"Zuko, do you know your destiny?"
That was an easy question.
Although his Uncle said that it was no longer like this, he still believed in it,
"I will capture the Avatar, bring him to my father, and by that I would have restored my honour and right to the throne."
"I see." Roku stopped for a moment as if preparing what he will say,
"Zuko is that the destiny you chose for yourself?"
Zuko hesitated for a moment,
"Of course it is! I am the crown prince of the fire nation! It is my duty!"" he yelled furious.
"So as you are saying after you capture Aang, you will return him to your father, and then you would take the throne and become Fire lord at some point?" He didn't wait for Zuko to answer,
"Did you ever think, Zuko, that there is more than becoming Fire lord in life?"
No answer.
"Can you remember what happened down there?"
Zuko shook his head; he only remembered reuniting with his Uncle, that's all.
Roku did something and a brief of what happed appeared in front of them,
"Do you realise how strong you are child?"
"What do you mean?"
"Down there, you stopped the memory that the fog was playing, not anyone can do that."
"It was just a coincidence."
"You clearly know nothing about your power."
"What power?" Zuko was now irritated, what was Roku even talking about? How did he get here? And why was Roku telling him all of this?
"Down there you stopped your Uncle's bad memory and saved him right? That was the sign that proved that you were the Yin Yang warrior."
"The what?"
"The legend says that the Yin Yang warrior is the one who has power equal to the Avatar and maybe even stronger, he is born every five hundred years when the spirits decide that the right person was born, they give the power to keep balance.
Every time the Yin Yang warrior is born, a prophecy is written, sixteen years ago the prophecy was written once again, it said that the new Yin Yang warrior will be born as a fire bender..." Roku stopped here, it wasn't clear to Zuko whether he stopped to allow him to process, or for any question, or because he had something that he didn't wish to say, either ways Zuko didn't care as he already had a lot to process.
"You have the wrong bender."
"And why is that Zuko?"
"I can't help the Avatar! I am supposed to capture him to fulfil my destiny and become the fire lord I am supposed to be!"
"Zuko, that is the destiny your father wants for you, destiny is something you make with your own hands, no one can tell you what is your destiny, not I, or your father, or your Uncle, or anyone else."
He just has to sound like his Uncle.
"Still you're wrong; I know what my destiny is! It is what-'' He stopped realisation hitting him.
"Maybe not all of it, I never wanted to lose mom, or leave home, I- I DON'T KNOW ANYMORE!" The fire bender thought aloud yelling.
Roku listened carefully, it was the time he became the man he is destined to be, just like his Uncle did five years ago.
Zuko continued thinking.
If his mother was alive will he be like this? Banished, scarred, ugly, and desperate? So... So pathetic? No if she was here she would've known what to say, she would've helped him find his way.
Maybe Iroh and Roku were right after all? Maybe father did banish me to just get me out of his hair, he thought, yes, when he banished me the Avatar was nowhere to be seen, what if what Uncle said once was true, if Uncle did go and talk to him, about giving me a ship, and a crew, and a mission, will he have sent me away with no goal, no crew, nothing at all?
Maybe I was chasing a dream, maybe he will never except me back.
No! That is what Roku wants me to think, he is the past Avatar he just doesn't want me to succeed in capturing this one.
But he is dead, and why would he lie?
Although he hated to admit it, and fought with himself not to, now he only realised it was true.
His father never wanted him, avatar or no avatar.
If he did he would have spent 3 years at sea would he? His father would have at least sent him one letter, up to now he heard nothing from his father except that he wanted to kill him.
Uncle was right.
He never wanted me.
I am becoming more and more like my father by every step I take to try win his love back, till when will I keep lying? Even if I came back, he would still hate me, Azula would still hate me, and if I walked on their path mother and uncle will too.
I will never be like father and Azula, no matter how hard I tried, I will always be like my mother, it's who I am.
Never forget who you are.
Yes, I won't.
"You may be right about my father, but I can't be a help to the avatar, I have no power beside my fire bending and swordsmanship."
"I see, will you try this?"
The image in front of them changed, now it was one of what was happening right now in the physical world.
Zuko winced at the pain he saw on Katara and Sokka's face, a part of him screamed with joy while another screamed with agony.
Roku turned to him,
"Do you want to save the boy and the girl?"
He didn't know what to say, part of him wanted to, that part was back to his old self before the Agni Kai, another thought that this was beneficial as the avatar would have less help, thus easier to capture.
Roku looked at his great grandchild patiently.
Zuko somehow decided to help them; they were humans too, as he tried to think of a way to try helping them a voice spoke in his head.
I will help you young warrior.
The voice was for a female, it seemed so strange but so familiar; it was warm and comforting like his mother's, the fire bender had no idea what to do.
Follow my lead.
Now, his eyes started to glow red, while his lips murmured strange words he didn't hear before, yet it felt familiar.
Roku smiled.
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Sokka and Katara slowly began to relax, they no longer felt the terrible pain they were enduring before, it was all better, and they dropped to the ground, still crying.
Toph and Aang rushed to hug them, failing to notice Zuko's unconscious body, its eyes were opened and glowing red, Iroh rushed to his side the minute he fell back to the ground.
It was true then, Ursa was right all along, he was the Yin Yang warrior.
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That was some chapter, 4237 words to be accurate.
The longest chapter in my career yet, but it was fun to write.
There are a lot of questions for sure; Roku maybe is a little OC, Zuko had his "metamorphosis" already because they'll be busy doing something else before the cross road of destiny.
If you have any question just write it down in a review, okay?
This story maybe a little odd but I always were interested in the thought of a power beside the avatar, and it being Zuko is really nice.
We'll continue talking later okay, I appreciate your reviews, I won't mind answering your questions, and later to the next chapter.