Sorry that took so long. When school is in session, I really have only one evening a week to work on this – and sometimes not even that. Fortunately, spring break is starting in a week. I should be able to finish at least one new chapter during vacation.
Chapter 12 – Sweet Escape?
Azula rolled over groggily. Something had woken her up. She opened her eyes, blinked a few times, then froze. Anyone else might have missed it. To her own eyes – so accustomed to darkness – the pale and sickly trace of green luminescence was bright as daylight.
Her cell door was open.
An electric surge of strength jolted her sleepy body into action . Quicker than thought, her limbs were humming with the rush and thrum of battle fervor. Azula was on her feet and moving before she could even wonder who had opened the door.
Out she slipped through the portal to freedom, and down long, empty corridors on silent feet – a dim, swift phantom gliding through a dark and uncanny place. The ceiling, walls, and floor were bare metal, with doors lining either side. The glowing crystals were too few and far between, and threw more shadows than light.
The hallway seemed endless. How big was this place? Azula tried one of the doors, and stepped through into yet another featureless corridor leading nowhere.
Now she was flinging open doors at random. The passageways became more gracious and reminded her of the palace, sporting gleaming, black floors and wall torches, or tapestries, or elegant, curving arches. But she still couldn't get out.
She wouldn't have thought it was possible, but somehow the crushing sense of urgency had increased. Faced with this maze, Azula was balanced on the ragged edge of panic, and slowly tipping towards meltdown.
She opened one last door…oh please…and suddenly she was in the throne room. The great wall of fire burned straight ahead, and a familiar silhouette was seated behind it.
Azula advanced to the proper distance and knelt down. Moments ticked by, and still the figure didn't say anything.
Were they coming for her? She felt an itch between her shoulder blades, a nagging, insistent compulsion that told her to leave this place, to flee before they dragged her back to a slow, hellish death.
Azula couldn't take it anymore, so she committed an unspeakable breach of etiquette and addressed him first. "Daddy," she said timidly, "have you come to take me home?"
The flames slowly lowered until they were extinguished completely. Her father stood up, stepped down off the dais, and walked towards her. His callous face was set into its usual cold, expressionless mask. When he spoke, he spoke the words with the greatest power to hurt her. Like always.
"I don't trouble myself over failures. I honored you above all others by entrusting you with my kingdom, and you let me down."
The familiar guilt and desolation sharpened from a dull, thudding ache to piercing pain, like she was feeling it for the first time all over again. But Azula was desperate, and for once she talked back.
"You shouldn't have left me alone. I'm only fourteen."
Her father was now standing right in front of her. He looked down at her kneeling form disdainfully, and kept on talking as if he hadn't heard her.
"You continue to disappoint. You know what you have to do. You should have done it a long time ago."
She started to say something, but he clamped his hand firmly over her mouth. "Silence," he commanded. Then her father pried open her jaws and began to force feed her mud.
When he was done with that, he wiped mud all over her face. From there he moved downwards. When he reached her breasts, Azula struggled weakly, but she was still choking and gagging on the foul-tasting slime. He easily flipped her over and pinned her to the ground by setting his knee in the small of her back. As she writhed and suffocated face-down in a pool of muck, her father ran hard, slick hands over her entire body and covered her in filth.
Eventually the pressure lifted. Azula rose sluggishly, looked about with vague, unseeing eyes. After a few dazed moments, she wandered aimlessly away on shaking legs. As she did so, she noticed that she was almost black with grime. I need to wash my hands. The thought bothered her for some reason.
Azula walked straight into a wall. She turned around in confusion and stumbled off into a different direction. Now her nose hurt. But it wasn't as bad as the mealy taste of grit in her mouth, or the sick, queasy discomfort rumbling deep in her guts.
Her feet kept going somehow, and carried her somewhere. At some point, Azula passed through an open door and finally stopped. Uncle Iroh was there. He looked the way she remembered him from her early childhood, before grief and self-indulgence made him soft. Massive shoulders hunched beneath his armor, and his arms were crushingly powerful. Even his neck bulged with the thick muscularity of a boar-bull.
And his eyes were sewed shut with black thread.
As usual the sight of him made her throat burn, as a red-hot spike of anger and annoyance flared up. It shook her out of her stupor, and the world around her suddenly snapped back into focus.
He was seated above her on a dais, behind a podium and gavel in-hand. To his left, a lone figure occupied the jury benches. The young Avatar's eyes and tattoos were glowing, casting the room in eerie blue light.
"Azula, daughter of Ozai," intoned Iroh, "You stand accused of crimes against humanity, and especially of cruelty against my nephew, Zuko."
"You're hardly in a position to judge me, Old Man. You gave up that right when you refused to fight for your throne. And you're not exactly impartial. I demand a retrial, with a more suitable presiding authority."
His eyelids wept ooze and pus around their dark, imprisoning thread. "You will stand trial before this court, and receive your due verdict and penalty. Justice is blind."
"Apparently," snapped Azula. "Because you wouldn't be so damned smug if you just looked in the mirror, General Iroh."
"You stand accused of crimes against humanity. How do you plead?"
Azula flung out her arm and leveled a damning finger at him. "I refuse to hear this from you. Who's hurt more people than the Dragon of the West?"
"How does the jury find the defendant?"
The Avatar's face was implacable and inhuman as that of a young god. "Guilty."
Iroh slammed his gavel on the podium. "You're crazy. You've got to go. This court sentences you to pain…"
The Avatar jumped down to the floor and started advancing towards her.
"…to humiliation…"
Azula backed up as he came closer.
"…to helplessness…"
Her back hit the wall.
"…to violation…"
There was nowhere to go, and now he was standing right in front of her.
"…to oblivion."
Azula looked straight into the Avatar's gleaming, soulless eyes. There was no mercy or wisdom there, or personal warmth. Only power.
"What right do you have?" she whispered. "No one asked for you. Nobody voted for you, or swore fealty to you. You're not a god or a king. And you're only twelve."
"The balance must be maintained." His voice was completely toneless, and had a slight, otherworldly echo.
Then he reached out and tore the clothing off her body. Azula fought with all her strength and skill, but who possessed more overwhelming force than the Avatar? She ended up huddled on the floor, trying to conceal her nakedness.
Dear gods. What am I going to do? She hid her face as best she could, completely overcome by fear mingled with shame.
As if he could hear her thoughts, Iroh answered. "You know what you have to do. You should have done it a long time ago."
Before she could think any further, somebody grabbed her by the hair and began to drag her away. Azula looked back the whole time at her Uncle and the Avatar. They watched calmly as she was carried off by a stranger to some unknown fate. Their faces were totally emotionless.
A wild fury took hold of her, and Azula shrieked her rage. "At least I took responsibility for my own actions! I met my enemies face-to-face. At the North Pole, did you look those men in the eye? Do you hear their screams at night? Do you ever think of them at all?"
Her captor rounded a corner, and they vanished from sight.
He let go, and Azula didn't even bother to look up. She just lay there, shivering miserably and clutching her stomach. The roiling mass of ingested dirt seemed to have a will of its own. She could feel it moving beneath her skin, and the queasy, cramping pain had become a tearing agony.
"Something bothering you, Princess?"
Oh please, not now. Azula closed her eyes and willed the wry, familiar voice to disappear. It was laughing at her pain, and promising more.
"Get over it and get up. It's time for a shower."
She opened her eyes a crack, saw that she was resting on squalid tiles. Azula sent another brief plea to whatever god would listen. Oh please, not now. Like all of her prayers, it went unanswered.
"Believe me, Princess, you really need it. I know two-copper whores who are less filthy and diseased than you." Azula struggled to her feet. Kwan Yu no longer pretended that he didn't enjoy her naked body. As his eyes licked her up and down, he murmured, "Not that I don't like it, but the smell…"
Suddenly he was all business again. "Wash up. If you won't redeem yourself, then I will cleanse you of your sins."
For the first time, Azula noticed that he was wearing the robes of a Fire Sage. How dare he! Her hands curled into fists. "You don't have the right to absolve anybody of their sins, let alone me."
"Do you really think so? After all you've done? And still haven't done? You know what you have to do. You should have done it a long time ago. Now wash yourself."
Like always, Azula felt like weeping. And like always, she waited until the water could hide her tears. She walked to the nearest shower head and turned the handle.
A heavy stroke to her back sent her spinning to the wall. Azula stared at Kwan Yu in shock as blood oozed from her newest lash mark. He was still standing on the other side of the room.
He smiled. "What? Did you think water would be enough? Your cleansing will be a baptism of blood."
She went reeling as another injury was inflicted, and another, and another. Ragged, oozing wounds rent her skin, bruises blossomed, and bones splintered as all the abuse of the past months erupted at once over every part her body. Azula wheeled this way and that as she staggered under the force of invisible blows.
She tried to escape her torment by running away, lurching wildly and blindly wheresoever her feet led her. But she carried the awful punishment with her. Finally one last hurt marred her leg, causing her to knock painfully against a wall. She dropped to one knee, picked herself up immediately. If she fell now, she would never get back up again.
Two more steps …Was it over? She stumbled through a doorway, and…
…she was back in her cell. Azula found that she wasn't surprised. It was inevitable really, like stones dropping to the ground.
Her brother was sitting there with his arms crossed, wearing the robes of the Firelord. It should have been ludicrous, but it wasn't. She felt chilled to the bone. There was an empty chair next to him.
Azula's hands were on her knees. She swayed slightly as she struggled to remain upright. It was almost too much effort to bear, but she managed to speak around the coppery liquid in her mouth.
"Zuko, how could you?" I'm in pain. "How could you send me here to rot away? I always challenged you in open battle. One, clean shot, and you would have been beyond suffering forever. Couldn't you have returned the favor? Don't I deserve the respect of a worthy foe? The death of an honorable warrior? Why didn't you execute me with your own blade?"
The corners of his mouth quirked upwards slightly. "I didn't put you anywhere, Azula. You got here all by yourself."
She tried to think of an answer, to understand how that could be true. Zuko started talking again, and now he looked downright smug. "There's only one way out of here. You know what you have to do. You should have done it a long time ago."
The nauseous, burning sickness in her vitals finally begged for release. Azula fell to all fours and started vomiting. She gagged around something long and fibrous, and the choking agony went on and on as great, wracking heaves shook her entire body.
When it was done at last, Azula saw that she had disgorged a rope. It was tied into a noose at the end.
She remained on her hands and knees, gazing at the drool and snot and tears which were dripping down to join the puddle of bile on the floor. She remembered that her entire body was slick with blood and filth.
Oh gods, Azula thought, I'm so dirty. But she knew what she had to do. She should have done it a long time ago.
Without fear, and without hesitation, she picked the rope up off the floor and threw the end over a hook in the ceiling. She stepped up onto the empty chair and tightened the noose around her neck. Then Azula kicked the chair away.
Her neck didn't break – the end of her life had to match the rest of it. Even her death wouldn't be easy.
The noose was cutting into her throat, making it impossible to speak. She pled with her eyes instead. Please, Zuko. Please end this.
Her brother smiled with cold amusement, as if he knew what she was thinking. They had always looked alike, but at this moment Zuko's resemblance to her was uncanny.
"You taught me well, Azula. I'm not going to help you, even to kill you. I'm going to let you swing on the rope you made."
And he was true to his word. He sat there and watched and she twitched and kicked and twirled, and slowly strangled to death. The pain was immense, but eventually everything faded to darkness…
*****
Darkness. Everywhere. All around her.
For the first time in her life, Azula screamed – long and loud and piercingly.
It was the screaming that told her she was still breathing. Azula clawed at her throat, gasping and panting for air. She was panicked, shivering, sweating. Why was she so worried about air? But she shouldn't be breathing, couldn't be breathing, because…because…
What couldn't she remember? She was convinced that she had died. Azula flailed about wildly, completely disoriented. Her thrashing caused her elbow to strike against the cold, hard floor.
That hurt! She flipped over onto her stomach and gleefully beat the metal with her fist. Warm liquid started to seep down over her clenched fingers. Azula laughed the whole time. She was Alive! Alive! Alive! She must have dreamed that she died. You couldn't feel pain in the afterlife.
Or could you?
Oh my god. She had died and gone to hell.
Azula's sleep-fogged mind finally insisted that of course she wasn't dead. But for a second, reality teetered on the brink of dreadful uncertainty. Truth and fantasy were equally balanced, and she couldn't tell the difference.
For the first time she seriously wondered whether they were right, and she was completely and utterly insane.
"Oh gods, no. Mama, please. Please help me."
Softly at first, and then without holding back, Azula keened her misery to the air.
*****
Two hours later, Azula was perfectly calm and composed – serene, even.
Doctor Soong was not. Lady Killer had been doing his job. The entire facility was seething with barely suppressed violence. Daring acts of rebellion occurred on a daily basis. One inmate had managed to attack the Doctor. Now his face was bruised, and his shoulders hunched with tension.
Something was coming. Even the guards were twitchy, although they didn't know why. Everyone was waiting for it with hushed anticipation – whatever it was.
In truth, they were all waiting for her – for her to do her part. But even Azula needed a little help. She needed the fickle goddess Fortune – who had turned her back on Azula – to turn again and bestow just one kindness.
"Your resistance is really quite pointless," the Doctor was saying, "since your silence tells me just as much as your answers."
She didn't respond. Why should she? Apparently her silence was telling him everything he needed to know.
He kept going. "For example, there's a very, very important question you haven't asked yet. A very basic question. I expected you to ask it when you first arrived here. But not a word." He peered at her closely. "You don't even know what I'm talking about, do you?"
And so it went. Azula effortlessly kept up her side of the conversation, using her customary mixture of deflection, insinuation, and insult. These sessions were really so monotonous.
Then something completely new happened. A soldier came in, walked hurriedly to Kwan Yu, and whispered in his ear.
Kwan Yu left the room.
Azula's heart rate spiked. By the gods and all the spirits! The Powers didn't want her dead. Not yet. They had finally granted her the one kindness, the one chance.
She carefully hid her excitement, and gauged her position. How freely could she speak? Azula decided to be fast and bold. She didn't know how much time she had, and soldiers weren't known for their subtlety anyway. And if one of them did suspect something, would he even tell Kwan Yu? Men like him made enemies, not friends.
"Doctor," she said, interrupting him mid-blather, "Why don't we talk about your problems for once?"
He smiled gently. "I'm glad to see you take an interest in something, but don't you think this is just another excuse to avoid your own issues? Which are far more serious than mine, I assure you."
"I don't know, Doctor. You're problem looks big to me. Very big"
"You're not in a position to know anything about my life – except for my professional life, of course."
"It's hard to miss, especially down here. It's a large and tall and strong problem."
The Doctor suddenly stilled, and went pale as the moon. That's right, thought Azula, I mean what you think I mean.
He hesitated, bit his bottom lip. "How…How would you know about my problems?"
"Everyone knows about this one. It's the root of all your other problems."
His left eyelid started twitching. A large vein was protruding in the middle of his forehead, and a bead of sweat dripped off his nose. Azula wished he would control himself a little better. Don't give the game away, you fool.
"Even if what you say is true, which it's not, I fail to see why you would involve yourself."
She shrugged. "I'd hate to see it all explode in your face. Explosions can be dangerous for everyone."
"My, my. Aren't you cryptic. Not surprising, considering this is all a figment of your imagination." The Doctor was trying hard to sound casual. Azula resisted the urge to slap her forehead. "But I'll indulge you. Just what do you think you could do about my problems?"
She shrugged again. "I used to be good at eliminating problems. All it takes is opportunity and the right equipment."
He rolled his eyes. "Right. And in return for supposedly fixing this hypothetical problem, I'm sure you'll want something in return. I think I've listened to enough of this fantasy for one day."
Think it through, you slimy bastard. You don't have to hold up your end of the deal. "Have it your way, Doctor. But it seems to me that your time is running out."
They returned to their usual round of verbal sparring, which was just as well. It wasn't long before Kwan Yu came back. The Doctor gave him an ugly look, and didn't quite hide it in time.
Kwan Yu couldn't resist bothering him anymore than she could. He walked up behind the Doctor and gave his shoulders a friendly little squeeze. "Hey, Sweetie. Did you miss me?"
Doctor Soong shook him off and looked sick. "Not really," he muttered. "Everything was fine."
"I'm glad to see the big, bad girl didn't hurt you while I was gone."
Azula watched them gleefully. She couldn't have planned that any better.
Their secret, little discussion never came up again, but she could practically see the wheels turning in Doctor's Soong's head. She had been drip, drip, dripping poison into his ear for a long time. Apparently it was starting to pay off.
When it was time for Kwan Yu to apply some "persuasion", the Doctor cut him off sharply. "Not today. I'm sick of you both. Just…just take her back to her cell." He was massaging his temples like a man with a splitting headache.
Azula couldn't see it, but, as they carried her out of the room, she could feel the Doctor's intent gaze boring into her.
She took it all in stride, and reveled in her newfound tranquility. She had made her play, the die was cast. Something would come of it, or it wouldn't.
If it came to nothing – well, she knew what she had to do. Maybe she should have done it a long time ago. Earlier today, as she sat alone weeping in the darkness, a novel idea – a revelation, really – was born out of nowhere. As soon as the thought was thought, a promise was made, her resolve set in stone. The unthinkable was now perfectly acceptable, even welcome.
Her veins were thin, and her teeth were sharp.
She would be leaving this place soon – one way or the other.
