Cheng padded his way into the kitchen, humming to himself. Ah, what a beautiful morning, he thought. Tossing some assorted berries into a blender, he wondered, what was the breakfast mood? Tutting to himself, he bent down to look through the fridge. Inspiration struck. He picked an avocado out of his fridge, removed the seed, and plopped it on top of the berries. He added ice and honey but still something was missing. Opening up the fridge once more, he scanned the contents: oat milk, soy milk, coconut milk, almond milk. Decisions, decisions. Almond milk sounded as good as anything. He poured a splash over the top of his concoction, pushed on the lid, and hit blend.

Pleased with his work, he made his way into the bedroom and hopped onto his exercise bike for an early-morning workout. Today was National Bike to Work Day. He wouldn't be partaking since EKPR studios was out of his range, but not one to miss out on the fun, he decided this was the next best way to celebrate.

After a quick shower and outfit change, he drove into work. Not even the traffic could get him down today. He was feeling good. It was one of Cheng's more productive mornings. He usually only had time to make a smoothie or workout. Never both. He reached down to his cup holder to take a sip of the aforementioned breakfast beverage and grasped at nothing. He left his tumbler at home. Well, he figured, it gave him an excuse to stop by his favorite coffee shop. Luckily, it was only a couple blocks up the road.

"What will be the name for that?" The barista asked him after placing his usual order. A grande, bone dry, four-shot ristretto, two-raw-sugars cappuccino. He told her his name and leaned against the counter to make some small talk while she worked.

"So, you know, I'm on a juice cleanse right now," he told her proudly.

The barista paused in the middle of writing his name on the cup. "Are you now?"

"Yeah. I don't know what all the fuss is about. It isn't that hard."

She paused to look at him and then dropped her gaze down to the cup in her hands. "Uh-huh," she said. She finished writing on the cup and turned away from him to finish his order.

He browsed through the case of pastries on display. The seasonal pumpkin spice donut holes called to him. He eyed them cautiously. No. He had to leave them behind. He grabbed his drink and spared one final look at the donuts before leaving. They probably weren't keto anyway.

Work went by smoothly enough. He listened to the drafts of a couple of episodes. After each one, he wrote a short reflection to send back with feedback. Most required just a few tweaks here and there. Nothing major. He predicted that the draft for the new The Burning Questions episode was enough of a dumpster fire that it wasn't even worth a listen. There's no fixing stupid. He signed off on payroll for the month and forwarded the budget to the board for approval. Being that it was only noon and he had effectively progressed through the agenda for the whole day, he had time to run some errands that he had been putting off for quite some time. They had some updated promotional products for The Burning Questions with Hong that he needed to pick up from their partnering printing company.

He arrived at the print shop to find that there was a small hiccup with the posters. Apparently they put the dimensions in wrong and they were comically larger than expected. Someone also ordered cardboard cut-outs of the fire lord. He was a world leader, not a professional athlete. He didn't know who would want a lifesize replica of the strange man. No matter, he had a job to complete. It was no small feat shoving the posters and cardboard cut-outs through the hatchback trunk door of his prius. He slammed the trunk door shut with a satisfying thud when he was finished. As he drove out of the parking lot, he glanced at the rearview mirror of his prius to see Hong's stupid, smiling face staring back at him. Chuckling goodnaturedly, he headed towards his next errand.

The screen on his dashboard lit up with a call notification from his desk assistant. Cheng picked up. His assistant sounded panicked. He demanded that Cheng get back to the office as soon as possible. His desk assistant and him got along quite well, but the assistant was typically respectful and certainly not the type to make demands. He couldn't help but be annoyed by having to stop what he is doing and turn around. Sometimes it felt like a majority of his job was babysitting his coworkers. He supposed it was his own fault for thinking they could manage themselves while he was out. His coworkers were determined to mess with his groove, weren't they?

"Well what's going on? I should at least know what the big rush is for." He asked through the car speaker system.

The assistant paused for a long moment before responding with a stutter. "You-you won't believe me if I tell you. Just get back here as soon as possible." Cheng heard the beep signifying that the call had been disconnected.

Once he was back in the office, Cheng found his assistant, whose eyes widened when he saw him. He directed his thumb towards the side of the room to guide Cheng's line of vision. He looked towards what he was pointing at to find Fire Lord Zuko sitting in one of their plush decorative chairs, arms folded delicately across his lap.

The fire lord stood and offered Cheng his hand. "Hello. I'm Zuko," he said.

Cheng shook his hand, in shock. Without breaking eye contact with the fire lord, he addressed his assistant. "Clear out my schedule for the rest of the evening."

Cheng invited Fire Lord Zuko into his office. After offering him something to drink, and, after making him a cup of jasmine tea, they sat down to talk. Cheng knew exactly what was coming.

The fire lord took a deep breath and asked, "Is Katara here?"

Called it.

C'mon. There was no way that Zuko came all this way for Hong. It was like something out of a movie, the more he thought about their relationship. A Hallmark original story of a far-off leader chasing his dream girl across the globe to proclaim his love for her. It would have been that, at least, if Katara still worked here.

"I hate to disappoint you but she doesn't work here anymore. She quit a month or two ago."

"Ahh." His face fell. "Do you know where is it that she is working now?" He responded, hopefully.

Cheng didn't know how to tell Fire Lord Zuko that, as far as he knew, Katara was still unemployed. Instead he responded, "I am not entirely sure, if I'm being honest. Sorry about that..."

"Do you know where I might find her? I am trying to contact her."

"She might be staying with her brother? I can give you the address." He pulled out a piece of paper.

"I don't have a car. Or a license." Zuko admitted, quietly. Cheng could tell that Fire Lord Zuko was starting to panic. His grand plan was unravelling right in front of him. He seemed to be second guessing his decision to come out here.

"Right, okay. Don't worry about it, man. We can make a plan," Cheng counselled him. He supposed he didn't have anything else to do for the rest of the day. It was getting late anyway. Plus, he had to admit that he had always been a fan of Katara's relationship with the fire lord, even if he was a little strange. "Do you need a ride? I can take you."

Zuko lit up. "You do not mind?"

"Nah, not at all. Come on, lets go." Cheng got up. "We have lids that you can put on that tea"

They loaded into the car together. Fire Lord Zuko looked mildly appalled when he saw the front seat of Cheng's car was littered with posters of his own face. Cheng chuckled and helped move them into the backseat, to lay in a pile in between the two cardboard cut-outs. It tickled Cheng to think about the perspective of anyone who looked into their car at that moment. Sitting up in the backseat were cardboard versions of the same guy that was sitting right next to him. Of course today was the day that Fire Lord Zuko made a surprise appearance in his car.

Other than Cheng's short lived amusement, the ride to Katara's was pretty awkward. Cheng shifted his gaze from the road to Fire Lord Zuko momentarily. His leg was shaking as he watched the cars pass by. He pitied the poor guy. It takes a lot of courage to ask a girl out, particularly if said girl is Katara. Cheng wanted to know what exactly his plan of action was. "Soooo what do you want to talk to Katara about?" he started.

Fire Lord Zuko paused. "I want to make her a part of my council."

Well, that wasn't exactly the confession of love that Cheng was expecting.

"Yeah? She's a hard worker. I totally recommend her."

Zuko nodded to himself. He felt the unsaid feelings hanging in the air between them.

Cheng cautiously prodded him further, "She's quite hung-up on you, ya know. I've never seen her like this before. Not for anyone."

"Hung-up?" Zuko's eyebrow furrowed. Cheng supposed that "hung-up" doesn't sound like a positive phrase to someone unfamiliar to the Earth Kingdom dialect.

"Sorry, uh, it means that she has a lot of respect for you. That she likes you."

Fire Lord Zuko paused to think for some time, looking straight forward at the road ahead of them, before admitting impassively, "I think I love her."

His tone was so matter-of-fact that if it had come out of anyone's mouth other than his, Cheng would have assumed they were kidding. Instead he came off as disarmingly sweet. In an awkward kind of sense, absolutely. Still, Cheng couldn't help but be charmed.

They pulled up to the house. Zuko looked like he might be sick. Regardless, he gathered himself and opened the car door. Cheng rooted for him. Through the rolled down window of his car, he called, "Good luck, buddy!"

Cheng watched Zuko walk up the pathway and ring the doorbell. It wasn't far enough away that he couldn't hear the voice of, who he presumed to be Katara's brother, yell "pizza's here!" before opening the door.