A/N: This chapter makes some callbacks to previous chapters and because I update slower than a sloth on Xanax, it may be best to have the rest of the story fresh in your mind.
As always, feedback greatly appreciated.
Warnings for medical descriptions.
Raw, unfiltered sun bearing down on him was not something Zuko expected to feel again. To be honest, he hadn't expected to feel anything.
Ever.
Not after that earsplitting crack of a gun, the explosion of pain and then…
Nothing.
Now there was noise. Thrumming, humming. A rhythmic pulse of vibrations that rumbled through the marrow of his bones.
The whole of him was numb. Hands. Feet. There was only pressure in his chest, making it a struggle to breathe. Heart struggled in its hammering, an invisible hand gripping it in a vise.
At least not dead. Not yet.
He'd been here before, this dark and terrible place. It was hard to hold on, dancing on the edge.
It shouldn't have been any worse a second time but it was. There'd been more of a child's hope when he hadn't known of the road that lay before him. How much struggle went on through new scars, new suffering. And now, he was forewarned.
So much easier to just let go.
Except he wouldn't.
He couldn't. This was no longer just about him. Not if there might have been some chance he was still necessary. Not if there was some miniscule way he could be of use.
Eyes cracked opened with agonizing slowness. Zuko shoved any doubts aside to make way for bright, blue sky.
Wisps of clouds weaved in a sinuous dance around the horizon, the world shifting over and under him-
No.
He was moving. Or someone was moving him.
A stretcher. Zuko could feel the rough fabric underneath him, straps running across his torso to keep him pinned in place.
Panic spiraled up and up at this simple confinement. Agony radiated through his chest as he moved, bone shifting against fragmented bone as he struggled both the inside and out.
Recaptured. Prisoner again.
A soft moan escaped him as he tried to dig into what reserves he had left and came up empty.
The inarticulate cry attracted attention. A slim silhouette appeared within his field of vision; a floating head bobbing alongside him as he was carried. What details Zuko could make out revealed a uniform in welcome colors, triggering a wellspring of relief.
He forced the air from his lungs. "Sss… Sssokka-"
"Hey!"
The greeting was warm. That part was familiar enough but the voice…
Zuko willed his eyes to acclimate, desperate for more detail. He could see a smile. Fragile hope built for the sake of hoping and it burst like a soap bubble when he could finally make out that the smile came from the wrong face.
The soldier who was not Sokka covered them both with cheer. "Mighty glad you could join us."
The man's thick Texan drawl poured over Zuko like honey, thick and cloying, too unlike the voice he'd hoped to hear.
"Try not to talk, son. Figure I can do plenty a that for us both." Producing a field knife, the medic lifted the edge of Zuko's shirt. A few futile passes of the blade later and the Texan scratched at his head in blank astonishment. "Sheeit! We gon' have ourselves a little chat about this after we get you all tucked up in our helo."
You. Not both. Not two. Just you.
A sense of urgency had Zuko trying to sit up before his body let him know this was a very bad idea. Barely moving a millimeter and a hot spike of pain knifed through his torso. In his battle to breathe again he felt something awkward and plastic bracing his neck.
A cervical collar.
Pragmatism tried to reassure him that it was nothing out of the ordinary; just the usual business of transporting an injured man but the unyielding restriction around him set off into a fit. This was what confined him, not weakness, not injuries. He was still alive, wasn't he? Surviving what should have been unsurvivable. He needed to get off his ass and this was to blame for making him so fucking useless. Break out of it and he could find Sokka, find out what happened. If he was free of it, he could do… something. He could…. he needed….
He needed to breathe.
His struggles began inside himself as much as anything else.
"Whoa there," The Texan's drawl softened to a soothing touch that had hidden behind all that easy bravado. "Maybe you didn't notice, but your ass has been pretty well kicked! Me and my crew wanna help you but you gotta let us do our job." The smile came back wider than before. "Try to take it easy so we can get you saved."
Saved.
What a meaningless word. Zuko only had one question and no way to ask it.
Eyes too heavy to remain open, he focused instead on the sounds that permeated the air around him.
The crackle of radios was almost tangible, bursts of static leaving marks on his skin. Voices shouted out from tiny speakers, completely incomprehensible over the whoosh of helicopter blades though from the sounds of things the Texan had no problem understanding them.
"Yeah, this is two oh four victor," the soldier barked into his radio, folksy twang disappearing when work needed to be done. "We're doin' a CASEVAC in sector alpha four zero niner. We got bad guys in the area. Loadin' up both our boys right now…"
Both.
Both.
Zuko flinched as fingers caught him off-guard to pry his eyelids apart. A sharply defined beam of light hit the back of his eye, a palpable heat boring into his retina. Just as quickly it was gone, leaving behind ghosts of an image that wriggled across his vision.
He could still make out the Texan, though. The medic had lost a little of his spit and shine. "You'd best be ready for 'em. We'll take good care of 'em till we get there. Two oh four victor out."
They were close enough to the Blackhawk now that a strong downdraft kicked up by its rotors drove sand to bite at every piece of exposed skin. There was a jolt and many hands hefted Zuko in mid air, stretcher being hauled into the helicopter.
Zuko concentrated on drawing a breath, knowing one way or the other he might not get another chance to be heard. "A…Am-" The effort of a whisper felt like he was dragging his lungs through shards of glass. "Amaruq."
The Texan radiated astonishment. "Din't we already go over that 'no talkin' thing, you stubborn sumbitch?" He leaned in to shout over the deafening wall of sound. "You want ta know about the other private, ain'tcha? Don't you worry about him, son! We got the best of the best workin' on 'im. Well, not the best, 'cause that would be me."
The next part came out as a roar well over Zuko's head. "Now will somebody get me a flutter valve and a pair of gotdamned bolt cutters?"
There was a whirlwind of movement and locks were bolted home, securing Zuko into a bay inside the Blackhawk. The Texan stayed with him though, fishing for something in a pocket. "I see I need ta put your mind at ease."
His efforts produced a square of metal; a signal mirror.
The mirrored surface had seen better days, but Zuko couldn't look away.
There. There in the blurry, scratched up reflection was what he'd been looking for. It took a moment to see beyond the crew of medics working on a pale, unconscious form but there he was; Sokka, battered and bloodied but alive.
"Both you boys are gonna be all right." The brief glimpse was over once the bolt cutters arrived. The Texan took them with a roar of satisfaction. "Now that's what I'm talkin' bout!"
Even with pure brute force, it took the Texan more than one try to chew through the mystery fabric. "Damn, boy," he snarled, sweat beading up on his forehead at his labors. "Shit's harder to get in to then my date on prom night!"
One last grunt and the fabric gave way, stopping just short of a defect in the fabric that sat atop bruises blossoming over Zuko's heart.
A defect about the size of a bullet.
The medic whistled out a single long, low note. "Gotdamn! This shit's bullet proof? Who do I gotta blow to get me some a this magic underwear?"
The Texan was moving again and Zuko barely felt the needle that was inserted between his ribs. The vise that had gripped him for what felt like an eternity eased and he sucked down lungful after lungful of air, the pressure that had tried to suffocate him disappearing with the medic's intervention.
"Easy there, cowboy! I told you we'd take care a you." The weathered face turned serious for a moment. "And we'll take care a your boy too."
The world was a blur under new tears and Zuko permitted himself to hope once more. The pin prick to his arm was nothing and a wave of heat shot up his veins. He fought the anesthetic's slow, creeping lassitude just for a moment.
"Thank…," he began, not even getting to finish before the drugs pulled him into a deep slumber.
Hot. Hot. So hot. Holy fucking god he was HOT.
Sokka sweated through wave after wave of heat, his skin feeling incandescent. He was in and out of awareness, lost in a turbulent then and now.
Eyes like honey.
Wounded leg on fire.
Whiskey and toothpaste on his tongue.
The world turning grey around the edges from a blow to the head. Once. And then again.
Fancy hotel soap and kisses raining down his back.
The weight of a body falling into his arms limp and lifeless.
No. No. No.
Help had come. He'd seen it. Sokka fought against his fever bright imaginings. Hands holding him down came at precisely the wrong moment and Sokka fought them too.
"Sheeit, Amaruq! I don't need one more thorn in my side!"
The use of his name was a lifeline and Sokka clung to it with the world spinning dizzily around him. The cool touch to his forehead was completely unexpected and his jerk of surprise got his injured leg throbbing once more.
"Woowee! You are burnin' up!" came the voice again.
Ice cold wetness lay across his forehead, pushing the curtain back on his fog.
Help. Help had come and in the form of a crusty faced medic if Sokka could trust that this was no hallucination.
The jab of a catheter in his arm assured him that it was not. Sokka tried to look beyond the man tending him but vertigo slammed him back into stillness.
"Listen up, son." The medic kneeled next to him, shaking up an IV bag. "You need a whole lot a this special cocktail. I'll warn ya- this shit will make you wanna hurl from the bottom a your boots but we need ta get your temp down. Especially with that knock to your noggin'."
Sokka wasn't sure if he would have understood a damn word of what the man had said even if he had been in perfect health. He forced his tongue to move though it felt too big for his mouth. "There were two of us. Another private. He was hurt. Did you... Is he-"
"The bulletproof kid?" the medic asked in breezy distraction, starting the drip with cool efficiency. "He's sleepin' like a baby. Got enough morphine in 'im to bring down a steer."
This convoluted confirmation was more of a balm that anything the medic could have given him. Sokka settled back against the cold, hard deck as the man above him continued to poke and prod.
"What you got hidin' under there?" Scissors made short work of the bandage around his calf and in a heartbeat Sokka was writhing as it was peeled away.
"Sorry, sorry." The murmured apology was genuine but Sokka heard none of it as liquid fire lanced up his leg.
A silver whistle of appreciation once the bandage was finally gone. "That's gonna need a bit a work but this is a lot better than I was expectin'."
"They cleaned me up," Sokka whispered, silently thanking a nameless man for a moment of kindness. "When we were captured."
The medic let out a grunt. "Good. Nobody should leave this world with less parts than they came in with just a some cooties."
The possibility of losing a limb sent a shiver through Sokka. "What about antibiotics? That's what you're giving me-"
"Son, there some nasty bugs out there that ain't no antibeeotic will touch. You count your blessin's that someone saw fit to get this bad boy as clean as they did."
The medic didn't bother looking up as he gently poked and prodded, aging a hundred years in a second. "Folks been dealin' with this since the first time brother raised hand against brother. They got fancier ways to heal but they got fancier ways to kill too so ain't much changed in the end. And it's you boys that pay the price."
With a soft touch, he began swabbing the torn, angry flesh with disinfectant. "Politicians need to be out here patchin' up what damage they cause. Get their asses on the front line and war would be what our kids would know from history books. Now wouldn't that be somethin'?"
Time stood still for a moment before good humor washed over the man's mercurial face. "Enough a that. You mind tellin' me what you boys been up to for the past couple a days? Looked like one hell of a clusterfuck, I'll tell you what."
Sokka latched on gratefully to the deliberate distraction. "I don't even know where to start."
"Don't matter." The medic had a thousand watt smile as he cracked open a roll of gauze. "As long as you tell me where your boy got that fancy shirt. I reckon it's the only thing that kept 'im from gettin' sent home in a pine box today."
The comment was meant to be casual, peppered with the dark humor that was a requirement to maintain a hold on one's sanity when one was awash in death and devastation.
But Sokka... Sokka was running on pure adrenaline and this only shattered his illusion of calm.
"We were so close. He could have-" He gulped and gulped for air, wondering when he might burst. "We almost-"
A hand settled against his cheek.
"Easy there." The medic looked exhausted and full of sympathy. "Begin at the beginnin'. That's usually a good place to start."
The beginning.
Which one?
The innocent act of smuggling in a bar of chocolate that gave him the best friend he'd ever have.
A monster tries to warp his son and ends up making his child more of a man than he'd ever be.
Or the laughing boy who led his own personal army wearing tattered sneakers.
No.
Not here or there or a million other places. Too much pain and joy and everything in between. Best to keep the story simple.
Even if it had never been simple.
"There was this house," Sokka began slowly, trying to stem the flood of words that demanded to be given voice. "We'd been sent to clear it but it was bigger on the outside. Like there were rooms that should have been there but weren't..."
Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, Germany
Zuko woke to a clear head for the first time in… in…
He had no clue. Painkillers made the passage of time coalesce into a swirl of minutes, hours, days.
There were vague memories of reaching Camp Phoenix. The last coherent thing he remembered was being bundled up alongside Sokka in the belly of a C-17 for the packed flight to Germany, clinging to a vain hope that they'd be housed together. It was no surprise that they were directed to different wards as soon as they touched down. Moments of lucidity were brief and all too infrequent in the ICU but he grabbed on to them and held them tight.
The fog continued to clear with every second that passed. Eyes fluttering open, he realized the scenery had changed. It wasn't hard to memorize the pattern on the ceiling when it was the only thing you got to stare at during your waking moments.
Out of the ICU. In his own room. Maybe now he could get to a phone, get out of this fucking bed and do something-
Willing his body to relax, he took a deep breath and began to take an accounting.
No headache. For once. Good.
Chest burning. Sort of bad. This was not entirely unexpected when there was a tube poking him in the lungs. Propped up as he was, shifting positions turned its small fire into a roaring blaze so that put an end to that.
His leg. Under attack by a swarm of pins and needles. Had he hurt his leg too? Fuck. When? The absence of memory of anything leading up to it set off an alarm.
And an abrupt snort that was not his own made whatever concern he had disappear under a cloud of confusion.
He peered tentatively through the dim light, stiff and aching from so much immobility.
What he found would have prompted him to laugh if he were able.
There was a chair pulled up to his bed, the jacketed half of an elegant suit hanging across the back of it like a cape. The softly snoring man seated in it was propped against his bed. This sleeping form half sprawled across Zuko's thigh with a battered copy of Army Times making a poor pillow.
Zuko slowly reached out to tuck back the snow white hair that jutted out haphazardly against the man's collar.
"H'lo, Uncle," he whispered, not quite sure if he could believe what he was seeing but desperately wishing it to be true.
The soft words and softer touch was enough to rouse the sleeper. Iroh blinked at him blearily, looking every one of his years with his eyes rimmed with red. "Zuko?"
Zuko let himself ease into a long, slow smile. "That shirt you sent me," he rasped, disuse making his voice heavy and full of smoke. "I think it needs a little work."
And a floodgate was opened.
"My boy!" Iroh sobbed over and over. For the first time in all that Zuko had known him, his uncle looked unsure of himself as he struggled to figure out how to hold his nephew without causing further harm. He settled on catching up Zuko's hand in his own, pressing it to his lips again and again. "My dear boy!"
They needed no words, only sharing quiet tears between them.
Clatter, clatter, clatter.
Smack.
Sokka tried to wet his lips but his tongue felt glued to the roof of his mouth. Anesthetics still held him in their grip and his brain was addled. They'd kept him tied to an IV pole to pump him full of antibiotics for days before dragging his ass into surgery and his exhaustion didn't help either.
Clatter, clatter, clatter.
Smack.
He shifted at the noise, feeling like a patchwork quilt with so many stitches in him. The nurse had told him that the nerve graft had gone well but he remembered little other than the advice to sleep it off. The likelihood of going batshit crazy cooped up in here was pretty high.
Especially since he hadn't been able to see Zuko since the day they'd landed at Ramstein.
Clatter, clatter, clatter.
Smack.
Landstuhl was a goddamned maze. It was hard enough searching its corridors but going through them wondering if the next room or the next was the one where his mom had-
They'd confiscated his crutches the third time he'd been busted on a night time excursion. After the surgery, he wasn't even allowed to walk at all, not until his incisions healed, anyway.
But Zuko was here. Somewhere.
And Sokka was going to find him.
Clatter, clatter-
God damn it-
Sma-
What the fuck was making that noise? Maybe it was more of a rattle. They didn't have poisonous snakes in Germany did they?
Rattle, rattle, rattle.
Smack.
Still no clue. Even his eyeballs were dry and he blinked wildly, trying to focus with the drugs helping him not at all.
Rattle, rattle, rattle.
Smack.
Finally, his vision cleared. Crouched on the floor well below his line of sight was a visitor.
Rattle, rattle, rattle.
Smack.
A kid.
…
A kid?
Rattle, rattle, rattle.
Smack.
She couldn't have been older than 16 or 17, looking as if hanging out on the floor of an Army hospital was no big thing. Rattle, rattle, rattle was the noise from her loose fist as she shook it with practiced ease. She threw out her hand, casting a set of dice across the floor. A smack as they hit the wall.
The dice were free of imperfections and beautifully made. The girl ran her hands over the top of them, caressing the pair of what was it… sandstone, maybe?
"Uhhh," Sokka tried, throat feeling like he'd gargled with wet concrete. "Hi?"
It came out as little more than a croak but the girl gathered up her dice at the sound to fling herself into the closest chair. "Cool. You're up."
She made herself comfortable by settling into a chair cross-legged, unconcerned about propping up bare feet that were filthier than the dirtiest latrine he'd ever seen. He tried to catch her gaze but she stared off into the distance, unruly black hair dancing in front of her eyes-
Her eyes.
A pale green but with a faint haze to them that made them even paler. Could she see at all?
He tried to swallow to sound less like Chewbacca, but it did little to clear his throat. "Do I know you?"
"No." She looked bored, fiddling with the dice in her hand. Her fingers traced the dimples marking each side. "I'm not some crazy creeper or something. My dad's base commander and he makes me come work at the hospital after school so I stay safe."
The word came out as if it were the most revolting swear word she could come up with.
"So I help with small stuff," she continued. "Deliver food, run errands-"
Sokka tried not to stare. "And play craps?"
"What? I'm just an innocent little army brat." Her head canted towards him as if she were listening for something. "I wouldn't know anything about a game like that. Maybe you can show me how it's done?" A single die tumbled expertly between her knuckles. "Start with a tiny bet and work our way up."
Shit. Getting hustled by a teenage girl wasn't exactly how he planned on spending the day. "I'm a little light on cash. Maybe later?"
"Sure." The girl shrugged the thought away. "Anyway, I'm here to give you something."
He didn't mean to snap but it came out that way. "What is it? From who?"
"Keep yer pants on!" Her raucous laugh could have come from a truck driver. "I forgot, you're not wearing any!"
Blushing to his knees, Sokka performed a hasty check. His hospital gown offered little protection.
"Quit worrying, princess!" With a smirk of pure evil, the girl searched her pockets. "Even if your assets were swinging in the breeze, I wouldn't be able to see a damn thing."
Her face twisted up as she continued her search. "Aha! Here it is."
In her hand was a paper flower. Sokka only got to see it for a second before the girl used the back of that same hand to take a casual swipe at her nose before she offered it to him again.
He turned green as he took it from her. Anybody got some boiling water? Or a vat of acid.
"Your uncle is a nice guy," the girl said softly, all of her good humor gone. "It's a shame he had to take off before you woke up."
Uncle? Sokka shot her a look of disbelief but could see she was earnest.
His curiosity took over as the flower's complexity became more apparent. Delicate folds and creases came together to make a perfect lotus. It seemed a crime to take it apart but the scribbling of a pen along its lines meant it had to be done. Gently unfolding section after section, the message unfurled for him with a message scrawled along a section of newspaper. It was in a tidy script, clean and simple and somehow familiar.
My dear S-
Confusion went to war with his inquisitiveness but it was only a split second before Sokka dove right back into the heart of it.
I hope you pardon my informality but we are nearly family. Now that things have taken a turn for the better, I must see to other matters. I believe 104 is where you will find what you're looking for. In D ward. This lovely young lady may be able to offer some assistance. She's stronger than she looks.
-I
PS Don't forget both sides now. Time changes all of us but you must still be patient.
"Don't forget both sides now," he murmured, heart racing. "He wants me to sing Joni Mitchell?"
Fingers snatched the creased paper from his hands before flipping it over. "He means read the other side, dummy!"
For a moment, Sokka couldn't tell what he was supposed to be looking for. A section torn from the Army Times, the date was from when they'd been out in the field. News had always been slow to get to them out there and it hadn't helped that they'd been hip deep in shit since then. He flipped it over and again, looking for a second note but he couldn't-
His hands went ice cold.
The headline was right in front of his face. Big and bold for all to see.
ASSOCIATED PRESS- CHIEFS: MILITARY WILL COMPLY WITH DADT REPEAL
Over and over again he read it, worried that the words might disappear from the page.
They didn't.
His heart threatened to jump straight out of his chest.
It was happening.
This was really happening.
"Are you…" The girl crinkled her nose at him. "Are you crying?"
Sokka clutched at his cheeks to find telltale wetness.
"No!" he shot back, though the crack in his voice didn't fool either of them. "You can wander around the hospital, right? Can you find a… a wheelchair or something?"
"Why?" the girl asked, an eager glimmer of mischief in her eye.
"'Cause you and me are going on a little road trip." He smiled big and wide for the first time in forever, not bothering to wipe his tears away. "We have to find room D104."