"You're ripped at every edge but you're a masterpiece."
Ty Lee was pink, Zuko was red, Mai was gray, her sisters were a myriad of colors, and Azula was blue.
A person's core color would be outlined with other layers of colors. Ty Lee could see the way Zuko's passionate red aura melted into a gentle maroon around Mai, her aura warming to soft amber, their colors mixing when they smiled at each other, kissed, or held hands, no matter what the setting. Ty Lee could feel her own aura become fuchsia, her heart swooning over their simple love as they walked past her down the palace halls, wondering if she could ever attain something so pure and adorable.
When Azula walked past, she was icy blue.
Azula had always been blue. Ty Lee tried to recount the times she ever saw a different tone rise from her aura, but there were none. The Princess' aura had caught her eye all the way back to their days in the Academy, brilliant and cold, no different than the impenetrable ice of the Northern Water Tribe.
When Azula was driven and determined, hunting like the most bloodthirsty of predators, she was a cool, steel blue, as sharp as a razor's edge and just as refined. It was the aura Ty Lee had learned long ago not to interfere with, lest she be sliced by the Princess' unrivaled will to kill. This was the aura Azula had approached her with that day at the circus, and Ty Lee knew then that it was impossible to turn away from her.
When Azula was proud, she was a cerulean blue, as intense as a burning star and so bright, Ty Lee always had to look twice for flecks of white, but they were merely lighter shades of blue. It was the closest shade to happiness, swelling when Azula looked out the window at the conquered city of Ba Sing Se, her hands clasped behind her back to keep her spine straight. When the Princess paused and looked over her shoulder at her companions, Ty Lee was inwardly thankful that Azula could not see colors. The flicker of hungry indigo pulsing through her pink aura would have been unmistakable.
When Azula was excited, she was an electric blue like the lightning that seared from her pointed fingertips. Ty Lee gasped in surprise when the Princess cornered her like this in the Earth King's stolen bed, pressing her down with a kiss, thrilled with her coup and finally seizing what was hers, ignoring Mai's startled and embarrassed scarlet. Ty Lee clutched at her emerald robes and ripped them off to let the blue wash over her like ocean waves.
When Azula was complacent, she was a calm and collected navy blue, her hunger for domination sated. This shade took over when Azula sat up from bed and gathered her clothes, leaving Ty Lee stained with blue and smiling. This was the color Azula flaunted on their way to Ember Island, where they both could escape the eyes of the palace and perhaps, Ty Lee hoped, lie together in peace.
Ty Lee watched that day on Ember Island when Azula's aura pushed its boundaries, her blues attempting to match the hue and intensity of the other colors around her, but her jealous yellow-greens were viridian blue, and her attempts at romantic rubies came out as failed teal. This was the most Ty Lee could want for her, to try these different colors, if just for a few moments at a time, but Azula's aura was like a stubborn child that refused to change clothes.
Also that day on Ember Island, Ty Lee learned that when Azula was sad, she was a deep, dark ultramarine blue, almost black and melting into the midnight background in the fading fire light. When Mai and Zuko regained their regular maroon blend, heading back to the beach house, Ty Lee reached out to hold Azula's hand.
"I don't think you're a monster," she said, feeling Azula's aura pulse like a heart beat against her, as it often did when they were pressed close together. Ty Lee could feel her sadness and emptiness washing over her again, wondering if her pink would drown in the blue, but Ty Lee was always pink and she would never let it go. "I think you're beautiful."
And when Azula stood and kissed her beneath the stars, her blue rose to them, and Ty Lee's pink flooded in. They were purple, lavender, lilac, amethyst, and all shades of true romance that Mai and Zuko had yet to experience. They rolled around with it in the sand, lie alongside coral and seashells tangled in each other's arms, and let their colors blend like paint.
That paint, however, was cracked at the Boiling Rock with a horrendous scar of black. It was as if a bolt of ebony lightning had seared through them, Azula's anger at Mai ripping apart any semblance of friendship, and Ty Lee's fists driving that ugliness home. Their blended purple aura shattered into pieces like the shards of mirror that fell to Azula's floor as she became swallowed up in blackness, drowning in the blurred colors of a doomed aura.
Ty Lee's pink returned, but as she sat on the cell floor, she found herself somber. Amaranth pink in heartbreak and reflection. Mai's raging crimson did not help, but the gentle greens of the Kyoshi Warriors helped. They reminded Ty Lee of the very blues that Azula used to wear, but slightly different shades, healthy and stable. Through them, she could find her own balance.
And through them, she learned she would have to confront Azula again.
She prepared herself in every way possible. She gathered her white for bravery, pink for happiness, and green for security, ready to combat Azula's poisonous blues. When Ty Lee opened her cell door, a wall of iron bars separating them, she saw no blues resonating from her form.
There was only gray.
Azula was gray like smoke. She was empty and clear as glass, and her aura barely clung to her, worn more like a loose shawl than an identity. Maybe it was the pale morning light filtering into the cell window, maybe it was the crude cement bricks that surrounded them both, or maybe it was the stained straight jacket that bound Azula's hands to her chest that made her aura look this way. It could be a trick of the light, right?
Ty Lee kneeled at the bars. No, no it wasn't an illusion at all. Azula was as gray as her hollow dreams and absent mind.
Even her eyes, usually gleaming with gold, had lost their color. They were almost silver, in the strangest and most ghostly way.
"I still don't think you're a monster," Ty Lee whispered, as she had done to pull Azula away from the descending darkness that day on Ember Island. She didn't know if it would work again, but she had to try. "You hurt me, but I'm stronger than that."
Azula flinched away from her and said nothing, but she didn't have to. Ty Lee's eyes widened as she saw a flicker like a candle, a flicker of purple.
There was hope for Azula yet.