THE ANGEL THAT FELL
"How does it feel to have your hands free?"
She doesn't get it… she doesn't understand why Toph freed her hands from the elemental shackles. Was it some sort of mind trick… give you an inch and then see what you do with it; possibly so they can ease their conscious when they throw her in a dark dungeon or push her of a cliff…
"Are you putting that ointment I gave you… on your wrists?" Ursa continues, never desisting with her steady stream of questions. Always looking for a response, never satisfied with just walking over this stupid sandy road on the edge of the jungle, along the coast in silence. At least she knows were Zuko got it from-all this lets talk and share, grab a tissue and wipe snot and tears…
She goes quiet but Azula knows better than to think it is because she has given up on trying to talk to her, to get her to spill on some classified information… she is just working on a new string of questions to sing to her until they get to this scrap yard.
She could just incapacitate her right this very minute… but that would be counter productive when Zuko and Urchin arrive with the ship and Azula has Zuzu's mother bundled up-his physical hope tied up at the base of a tree. She knows it in her heart, there is no need to elaborate on the feeling or delve to deep into it-she won't ever be able to fight fire against Zuko.
Not to say she doubts her skill, not to say she fears her own blue flames… but striking him square in the chest that day, that stupid accursed day, had splintered something inside her and although it had not broken off from her soul, it had changed her.
He had jumped to save the girl. He had jumped to save the Water Peasant… he had willingly sacrificed his life for her, against… his sister.
All is fair in love and war.
He was stupid. It had nothing to with her that he got some high from having lightning coursing through his veins.
Stupid Zuko and his stupid mother… making her feel… stupid.
"I once went for a walk with you when you were young" Ursa murmurs after ten minutes of giving Azula side glances, smiling a little from beside her-the straw hat hiding her eyes but Azula can imagine the twinkling stupidity that would be there.
"Did you put a leash on me?" she asks-blurts out-but quickly stops her self from adding because I was such a monster, still am…
"Do you remember the Palace gardens?" Ursa asks in a sort of singing voice-the voice she uses on Zuko, the 'You have the mental capacity of a four year old' voice.
Azula grumbles, kicking sand so it goes up in the air in a beige grainy dust cloud and covers their sandals and feet. Ursa doesn't comment on that or jump away from the dirt-she just walks right through it like Sunshine Poodle-Ponies and Avatar's rule the world-what's a little dust to ones feet?
"The gardens had Turtle-Ducks then, do you remember" Ursa sighs, twirling her thick reed basket. "They would be in the ponds… quacking…."
"As Turtle-Ducks do" Azula groaned, rolling her eyes and pulling her straw hat more securely over her head.
"Yes, I went with you for a walk anyway" she smiles "Ozai didn't know this… he didn't like it when you did things your own age. You walked with too much intelligence; you didn't run around to see all the little animals around the garden… I was walking through the gardens with this little person I knew so little of although I had carried her inside me for nine months…"
"Can you keep your memories to yourself?" Azula hisses.
"…this little person who had so many impenetrable barriers, who wouldn't hold my hand and stared up at me with strange familiar eyes and asked me if we were going to the training grounds to do some fire bending"
"Do you remember the blue bush?" Ursa asked Azula who was grimacing in pain under her hat. She nodded brusquely, wishing the torture would end soon. She knew the memory-when Ursa had come to get her after her writing lessons and she had some without Zuko-and Azula had been so happy about that because although she amazed everyone else, Ursa never worshipped her the way she did Zuko. It was her time to be watched and cuddled-but as they had walked, she didn't understand it or know what to do. It felt stupid wanting to be cuddled…
"It is… it is still there" Azula murmured. "The bush… in the garden."
"Hmm" Ursa sighed. "The squirrel-rabbits that lived under it… they were so adorable. You wouldn't pet them, said they were contaminated!"
Ursa laughed, ignoring Azula's discomfort and sighed "What four year old says the word contaminated with such knowledged understanding…!"
"A gifted four year old" Azula growled. "Do not laugh at me… I warn you"
"What four year old goes around warning adults" she chuckled.
"I am not four…!"
"When I tried insisting you try petting the little babies, thinking you were just scared of them-Zuko had been scared of the Turtle-Ducks once-and I thought you just had to overcome your fear, you got angry and…"
"Burnt the pretty little bunny to death" Azula finished in a small echoing voice. "There was red on my hands"
"And what did you say when I gasped…?" Ursa asked her.
"When you screamed and jumped away from the dead bunny?" Azula asks dazed, holding her clean unshackled hands out in front of her-palms facing up-expecting to see the blood. "When you jumped away from me and I saw it in your eyes for the first time…"
"You said Azula" Ursa interrupts her hypnotized recall. "You told me that Father said the strong draw blood from the weak and it was okay. You were strong…"
"I was strong and a monster" Azula finished-a low growl-violently pushing her hands down at her sides, fists clenching and her demented control fighting to keep the fire at bay.
"You are strong and misinformed" Ursa murmured.
"Ozai made you bleed countless times" Azula hissed scathingly, revelling in the power she feels when Ursa shrinks back from that-like she had just been slapped.
"You bled in front of your tea party guests, right between your legs..." Azula laughs. "How disgusting"
"The weak bleed" Azula says her head held up. "And you bled all over the place, countless times and your cursed bleeding and bruises made Zuko weak too"
"But you-Princess Azula- remained strong through all of that" Ursa murmurs.
"I never cried when he beat you for your indiscretions, for killing the baby" Azula murmured, smirking at Ursa's teary eyes. "I understood that… there needs to be order, discipline and perfection"
"You are weak Ursa" she continued, relentlessly pushing at the vulnerable bruised flesh of the past "Sprawled on the floor like a bag of beans, bruised and battered… unable to get up when commanded without the help of a wailing weak son…"
"Ozai's words come out of your mouth!" Ursa shrieked. "I want to hear your words, Azula…!"
"You were trying to make me weak with your pitiful form, but I saw through you guise" Azula finished nonchalantly-feeling an odd lost strength return to her as Ursa failed to hide her pain-her weakness.
"Feeling pity is weakness?" Ursa asked, her voice bubbling with moisture.
"Of course" Azula laughed sharply. "Pity gets in the way of doing the right thing for the greater good!"
"Did you never wonder why he beat me?" Ursa whispers.
"He told me why he beat you…"
"You were five or four" Ursa says scowling "What in Agni's name could you have understood…"
"I understood far greater than Zuko's snivelling older self!"
"So, you think it is okay for a grown man…" Ursa says her voice rising. "Tell me Azula, because I know you are exceptionally intelligent and deductive with everyone else and yet when it comes to Ozai you believe so blindly…"
"Tell me Azula" she roared. "That when your father was disciplining me for comforting your brother after he broke him down to nothing-his own son- it was okay for him to beat his pregnant wife?"
"Uh…."
"And that when you broke your little knee training ridiculously hard" Ursa continued "It was my weakness-my stupid pity-that made you rest for two measly days that warranted a war with Ozai. A fire bender against poor pathetic me? He was tall, slightly shorter than Zuko but tall, big man and I had limited training in any defence forms at the time but he would still fling balls of fire at me…"
"You are weak!" Azula shrieked.
"Why?"
"Because you…"
"Tell me the truth, Azula" Ursa whispered, halting their walking as Azula paced through the sand-her hands waving in the air on their own accord. "Why was I weak to you... why was the bunny weak…?"
"You didn't fight!" Azula roared. "You wouldn't fight… you would just lie on the floor while he kicked you… how could you be my mother if you didn't even fight to defend yourself!"
She stopped walking, her hands clenching and unclenching and her vision blurry with hot liquid pooling in her eyes. The sky was clear, hot sun burning down on them but she could see two clouds she didn't like looming between the fake azure calm ceiling… her fire burning in her chest but she feared it too much to even let a flicker escape.
"Azula?" Ursa whispered, walking over to her-right behind her. She felt her hand rest carefully on her shoulder-timidly. She was tall-like Zuko-but not a towering awkward giant-she was in control of her form. She liked being tall-it reflected her standing. She didn't like being taller than Ursa and needing to have her hand hold her up.
She felt Ursa's hands go around her, locking in front as she hugged her from the back. She wanted to tell her not to touch her, not to hold her and to stop making her weak but instead she stiffened and allowed the movement. Her heart frantic and tears sliding over her cheeks.
"I didn't fight because I was defending you, baby" she whispered in her hair. "I used to fight once, before I had Zuko and you… but it's different when you don't have anything to lose. You fight hard and viciously when there is nothing at stake but your own life…"
"You know…" Ursa released her and Azula quickly wiped her eyes, her eyes going comically wide to keep the rest of the tears at bay. "Your father and I were in love once."
Azula scoffed before chuckling derisively.
"Yes, we were!" Ursa giggled-a very girly sound. "He courted me and everything. I think we had been lucky unlike Iroh to not have our love manoeuvred. But even then he had a temper and a sort of compulsion for being the best. I should have taken it as a warning but you now, when it comes to rebels-especially in youth-we silly girls think we can tame them. You can't tame them… you can only…"
"Cage them" Azula finished.
"Yes" Ursa said coolly "Maybe… but… in peace, it was not so necessary for a woman to be trained in the arts of battle. I had training of course, due to my father… and believe me when I say it was enough to go against Ozai and his fire when he got angry. It involved burning down rooms and injuring poor civilians in the wake of our wars…"
"All is fair in love and war" Azula murmured.
"Ozai and I… our love, Azula… was a war" Ursa laughed, picking her bag from the sand. "And what the Victor wanted… the most important thing at the time for him, before Lu Ten died and your father loves to be the victor… was claiming you and Zuko. So we fought in this war… with different arsenal…"
"You weren't fighting for me"
"I was Azula" she whispered, reaching her hand out for her daughter-willing her to take it and override the memory of her toddler self refusing it. "You were just fighting against me… you were his weapon against me, at the time…"
"But Zuko…" Azula murmured, her hand twitching as though Ursa's scarred rough hand had some form of magnetism. "He still wanted Ozai… he had you both, in a way…"
"I never told Zuko to hate his father" Ursa said smiling. "I never allowed him to stop loving him… at the end of it all; Ozai will always be Zuko and your father"
"We had better keep moving, if Urchin and Zuko arrive before us… they'll have extra time to try and kill each other" Azula said sombrely, taking her mothers hand gingerly.
"He looks at her like she is a rare large diamond" Ursa laughed turning Azula's hand over in her own in fascination. "It's sweet…"
"He looks at her like he has never seen a woman before, drooling…" Azula snapped. "It's disgusting…besides, he has Mai, a chosen respectable noble…!"
"The heart has the final say, Azula"
"But the mind…"
"…Can war it out with the heart" Ursa grinned. "All is fair you say…in love and…?"
"We will put your intense warrior skills to the test now, dear…mother" Azula said softly watching the sea through narrowed blazing eyes. "War is not for the faint hearted"
Xx~xx~xX
"The sea brings in all this metal and stuff?" Azula asked, picking up a long shard of smooth metal and lifting it up in the air and turning it over in the sunlight so it gleamed and shined like something more valuable.
"Well, yes…" Ursa said reaching for the metal in Azula's hand. "The island's position I think, situated over some kind of magnetic…"
"It's cloaked" Azula finished "Storms rotate around it, pushing anything in its radius in and keeping anything along the perimeter out…"
"The storm allows things to enter the perimeter" Ursa murmured. "No storm…"
"No entry…" Azula finished, looking up at the clear sky. "Or exit…"
"You can only leave when another storm hits…" Ursa said, turning to face Azula. "You build the boat and when we have another sea storm…"
"Boat…" Azula said softly.
"Yes, Zula… we need the boat… to help you…?"
"No…!" Azula shouted, knocking the shard out of her mothers hand annoyed. "There is a boat on the shore!"
She turned Ursa around abruptly and pointed north up the beach, a little bump over the shimmering sand horizon and barely visible with the fusing sea fumes.
"Do you see it…?" Azula asked softly.
"Yes…"
"Was it ever…?"
"No" Ursa said, taking a step forward. "That there… came in with the storm… your storm, the storm that brought you to me"
"There is someone here…" Azula hissed, trying not to succumb to the vulnerable euphoria welling up...
The storm that brought you to me…
"Someone like whom?" Ursa asked.
"We were followed… they found a trail…" Azula murmured. "The army… the rebel army. That boat is a cast of from a main ship…"
"The main ship can't enter the perimeter without the storm…" Ursa said slowly.
"Nor can the boat exit without… this is bad" Azula said shaking her head. "Where are Zuzu and the great Grand Master Earth Bender…?"
"It's a small boat Azula…" Ursa said, chin jutting out. "Probably had two soldiers on board… nothing we girls can't handle…."
"I can't…" Azula mumbled. "Fire Bend… I can't do it"
"You are the prodigious Azula?" Ursa said "You always said Fire Bending made you strong?"
"Well…" Azula scoffed. "That was before I went mad"
"I thought it was that you were always mad?"
"Just half insane" Azula laughed. "Turned full circle in good time… Now, we should probably hold an ambush for our stalkers…"
"You are the expert ambusher"
"That I am" Azula murmured a small smile playing on her lips.
Xx~xx~xX
AZULA
Power and influence is the bread that leaders use to keep their nations in motion, to get things done. There are countless forms of power and to conquer all is to conquer all. Socialized power which is to say an elected leader is out to benefit others and possibly the most easily corruptible form and Personalized power which is the right of any royal.
A right to lead…
Being born in the line of the dragons, being born with the blood of the first true leaders to the world, the first true wielders of Fire as the absolute weapon, the absolute power… entails being born from power and fire itself. The chi of a Fire Bending royal is tangibly and exponentially greater than that of their surrounding plebs.
Lava courses through our veins… Power and Fire is the drug we chase and combined they form the invincible.
Xx~xx~xX
FROM THE ASHES…
"No!" I gasped jumping of the boat and landing clumsily on the ground.
"Zuko!" Toph called panicked. "Get back on Zuko…. We have to go!"
I walked over to the edge of the clearing, the fire ploughing the immobile flowers into their ashen grave, the smoke thick and sweet in the air and the heat wafting past my face as the wind fuelled the speed of my destruction.
"Zuko…!"Toph huffed, jumping of the boat and stomping over to me. "Why have we stopped…?"
"The flowers…" I said softly, dazed as I watched the fire roar and sprint over the field, smoke saccharine to my nose in Fire Lily spice and Lotus sweetness.
"The field has flowers, okay I don't…."
"Fire Lily and Lotus flowers" I said slowly.
"Zuko… are you… having… is this a nervous breakdown?" she asked softly and I could tell she was entirely serious.
"This Lotus flower… its beautiful, Toph. Green with cherry peach coloured petals from its centre… it emerges from the mud beautiful and perfect" I said, walking closer to the perfumed heat.
"And the Fire Lily only grows in top soil… in heated lands" I whispered, the smoke stinging my eyes. "They should not grow together… it goes against their very nature…."
"The soil here is full of minerals" Toph murmured from beside me, digging her toes into the ground easily. "Maybe that caused the plants to restructure their make up…?"
"Maybe…"
"You have a plant fetish… okay, but can we go now?" she asked. "This air is wreaking havoc on my sinuses… a nose that is much more sensitive than your own…"
"I…" I muttered but then I spotted two withering plants on the far edge of our destructive path, blowing pathetically in the heated and too sweet air. "Get back on the boat, I'm right behind you"
I scooped them up carefully-cupping the large mounds of earth covering the thin shrivelled roots-in my hands with the flowers and rushed back to the boat.
"Here Toph, take them…!" I commanded and she rolled her eyes.
"Take what?"
"The plants, Toph!"
"Argh…!" she groaned, but reached her hand down awaiting the contact; I carefully cupped her hands and placed the plants in them before swinging over the ledge of the boat.
"This soil is very rich" she said handing the plants to me. "And you are entirely weird"
"Well, this weird Fire Lord just saved two possibly rare plants from extinction!" I snapped.
"After setting in motion their extinction" she grumbled, pushing the boat through the vegetation.
"You are the one who made me set fire…!" I began but she cut me of with a quirked smirk.
"Not the blame game again…?"
Xx~xx~xX
The rest of the journey to the beach is quiet except for my murmuring directions to Toph to avoid crashing into trees. She doesn't smile and her lips are set into a thin line and I know now the destructive power of uttering words that one doesn't comprehend…
I have Mai. I love Mai. I am Mai's… what right did I have to feel like I had a claim on her? What selfish emotion had I allowed to nestle into my heart? She was my friend… wasn't that what I had asked of her a few years ago… for her friendship.
You asked that of her when she didn't have those hips… and she called you out on it, pervert
I looked away from her and paid more attention to my two young flowers. An altered structure she had said… they would only grow in soil similar to that of the soil from the now burnt and ashen clearing. Where would I find soil like that in the Fire Nation…
"Do you think I will find this type of soil in the Fire Nation?" I asked Toph softly, willing the barbed rift between us to disappear-willing her to stop thinking whatever curious and harmful thoughts were playing in her mind.
"You can ask one of your many servants to find that out for you" she said tersely "After you reclaim your Nation and weed out the corruption"
It never really ends; this battle to prove myself to the Fire Nation, to everyone...
That brought the silence back full fold and I realized that even though I had Ursa and had found a happiness I had never known, I had lost one I had become accustomed to by one simple slip of treacherous emotion… Being the Fire Lord-the happiness of the title eluded me and yet I fought tooth and nail for it.
I watched the sad plants huddled together and thought that in this instance, if any of the former poisonous generals had offered me this one thing… I would have taken it willingly with little thought of consequence and handed my title freely.
Toph Bei Fong's simple and true Friendship over being Fire Lord?
Xx~xx~xX
"Toph please…" he begged walking over the hot sand-bare feet crunching through it indifferently.
"You said I made you love me?" Toph asked again, leaning on the boat, her gaze seeing past him, through him…
"I said it… I meant as a friend" his heart squeezed giving him away and he thought she raised a knowing eyebrow. "I care and you go and…"
"Liar"
"I love Mai…" he whispered, gulping hard and staring at the two flowers in his hands. He had scooped them up dirt and all-the only survivors of his inferno. "It doesn't mean you are not important to me…"
"I don't know what you want me to tell you!" Zuko shouted, a one-eighty turn in mood, rounding on Toph. "I am concerned… believe it. Stop reading my heart… just… take what I tell you and leave it!"
She listened to his heart beat; its unsteady pattern had not stabilized at all-as though he was running on adrenaline and not air and blood. She couldn't tell if he was lying because of this, she had to be brave and simply call him out but she knew he was reaching his limit. Push too hard and they would end up tumbling in the dirt while waiting for Azula and Ursa to arrive…
If she pushed too hard he would call her out too. She hated how alike they were… she was better at it than him, using that very similarity against him, calculating it… but it was hard when he meant everything he said, it was hard when he made sure she was the one person he didn't lie to and when he knew how to answer in half truths and confuse her with his very presence, derail her conviction with his coarse voice and muddle up her thoughts with his heated skin and sharp musky spice …
What was wrong with them that a simple matter of touch could feel so sinful, so entirely sacred and possess an atomic power that threatened to blow them up if they held on to it for to long? Like they were two chemicals that if mixed would explode and destroy everything near them and yet they were the only two who understood what it was like containing an energy and power like that. What was it about them… about him? She thought it was his soul, his strength… the glowing centre in his body that made him thrum and vibrate even when he was still. It felt so sacred, so pure and personal. It felt like every time she felt it, she was stealing the most private part of his body…
His stupid fascinating chi… even now as he stood feet from her, she could feel the pulse over the hazy canvas of the sand-pulsing with an other worldly energy, like a heart beat… only the force he unknowingly used to contain it made its strength treble with each day…
Unlike Azula's ticking time bomb…
"Zuko!" she hissed. "Azula… I can feel her uh… I can see her in the jungle…"
"Oh, finally" he sighed, placing his plants in the tins he asked her to make for him moments earlier, when she had not reminded him that he had had his royal jewels crushed, lost an argument and said something entirely inappropriate and torturously beautiful to her ears…
His stupid words had sounded like heaven… she wanted heaven… but it wasn't hers to want. As always…
"No, something isn't right…" she whispered moving towards the forest "Azula is worked up…"
"Come on then….!"
They disappeared behind the screen of trees to investigate, never noticing the little boat at the edge of the horizon where the sun was disappearing and setting the sky into a fearsome red and orange haze with two looming little cream clouds.
Xx~xx~xX
"Azula!"
She had my mother kneeling in front of her, blue flames licking at her sides, her face shining with sweat and eyes large and crazed. Behind her, two men lay unconscious and bound on the ground. She stood on a boulder, her height imposing and stance unbearably frightening…
"What…!" Azula shouted turning her head stiffly towards me-as though she didn't want to but there was some other being commanding her to do it.
"You didn't really think I would follow, I was born leading…" she cackled and Toph pushed forward ahead of me-I grabbed her small hand quickly, urging her back to my side.
"We can take her!"Toph growled. "I knew I should have let her go… as tricky as a…a…Fire Nation Royal!"
"No…" I said softly, watching her crazed eyes shift from Ursa back to me. Crazed but confused, as though there were two people inhabiting her singular body…
"Stay there, Toph and Zuko…" Ursa called. "This is nothing serious… just a little set back…"
"She obviously has not been on the receiving end of 'crazy Azula's big nothing'" Toph murmured disbelieving, her fingers twitching and feet shuffling over the hard ground.
"Is it a hostage situation?" Toph asked gruffly. "What… who are the men? What is going on here!"
"Azula's back" I whispered.
"I have been trying…" Azula drawled, swaying on the top of the boulder as though intoxicated, her fire burning and retreating freely and uncontrolled.
"I have been trying…" she slurred, her eyes watching Ursa with confused intent, her chest rising too fast and feet unsteady on the boulder.
"Zuko, we need to contain her now…!"Toph hissed, tugging her hand angrily from my own.
"I…if she was going to do something, she would have done it, there is no strategy…" I stammered watching in pain as my sister contemplated damaging my mother, as my sister fought some unknown battle inside her… "No… I can't… we can't… this isn't the same as before, Toph"
"I know" Toph whispered back licking her dry lips. "She is about to explode…"
"Zuzu!" Azula screamed, stumbling a little before righting her footing. If she fell… the boulder was large and she was way too high of the ground-if she slipped and fell, it would be the end.
"Zuko….!" She shouted again but her narrowed eyes never left Ursa. "I have been wondering… I was wondering why mother here… why she never… we are here, being happy family Ursa and you are being dishonest!"
"Azula… I have been nothing but true…" Ursa begged.
"I was cruel… I am cruel…!" Azula shouted the last part with a sick pleasure, flaying her hands in the air, fire whipping through the air before disappearing. "I killed the bunny and…"
"Azula…"Ursa begged "You are not well…"
It was the power, the fire… hadn't it always been obvious…
"You hate me" she whispered desperately, almost as though she was begging for her to do it-admit it and feel it-hypnotize her into despising her truly. "Everything you say… all the lies you try to feed me…"
"No, Azula… everything I said to you was the truth" Ursa said with doubtless conviction. "You know it… why is it you are so afraid!"
"I knew… I knew he wanted to send you away so you would die" Azula cried her eyes flicking to my face in split second-a moment when they had changed back to confusion and fear. "I knew….how can you all look at me and not hate me…all of you… lies!"
"And here I am… after all the grand assassination attempts by your father…" Ursa murmured, rising from the ground carefully. "Here I am for you, Azula"
"What's stopping me from ending this" Azula whispered dangerously low to Ursa, her eyes flashing with the reflection of her flames-ice fire over gold. "What's stopping me from ending this display of… weakness?"
"Do you mean stopping you from killing me?" Ursa asked and Azula nodded. "Well, nothing really… but what I really wonder is what's stopping you from letting me love you fully?"
This derailed her, Azula's eyes widening… the odd terrifying inhuman gleam leaving them momentarily and replaced with something infinitesimally vulnerable, fragile and temporary.
"You hate me…" she said so softly, her voice oddly childlike. "He said… there is no way, you hate me"
"Azula…" Ursa murmured, reaching her hand out to Azula. "Even at your worst… I will love you…"
The flames died down before disappearing entirely and before my eyes my sister allowed her emotions free-going against the strict code we had lived under Ozai's authority, the lessons he had taught her of weakness and strength forgotten in favour of a love that didn't need to be taught but felt. How long had we priced love and acceptance, how long had we had to buy it and steal it from each other-Ozai's love?
"Get down from the boulder so I can love you before you fall again!" Ursa commanded and Azula took her hand quietly and I knew… the darkness had splintered, fissured off of her chi finally. We had found the temple and the only true cure to counter Ozai's destruction of Azula.
REVIEW IF YOU ARE HUMAN! REVIEW IF YOU ARE AN INDIVIDUAL! REVIEW IF YOU KNOW THE ALPHABET…! (Basically just review… ghost readers are loved still…)