Oh. My. Goodness. I don't think there has ever been a warmer welcome back for a series then what I got last week! You guys really know how to make a girl feel missed, I love you all so much!
Everyone who reads my work, all my lovely Kudos giving superstars, you are the force which keeps me going. I cannot express enough how much I appreciate all the wonderful kudos, comments, and support. This fic wouldn't exist without you!
One week is long enough for Zuko to decide he hates Ba Sing Se.
The food is too stodgy, the air too thick. Earth Kingdom citizens would rather bite their own tongues off than say they were sorry for shoving you or snubbed your well-deserved tip. And it always smells. Day and night. Wherever he went in the lower ring, he couldn't escape the fetid stink of unwashed bodies crammed together in one place.
Yes, one week was plenty to make an informed decision. Two working in Pao's tiny, stinking tea shop was enough for him to start tearing out his newly grown hair. Only his uncle's relentless cheeriness stays his hand. Barely. He keeps switching back and forth between being content at finally seeing Uncle thriving and wanting to ring his neck if he tells him to think positively one more time.
Zuko doesn't want a life here. Zuko doesn't want to start planning a different future. He's spent sleepless nights agonising over the what if's, most of them haunted by a pair of blue eyes, their judgement as bottomless as the sea. The flowers his uncle bought to spruce up their cramped apartment are purple and wilted, reminding Zuko of the frost iris he plucked from the south pole. From being tangled in endless waves of thick brown hair to being held between his pale forefinger and thumb. He wonders if it's still on the ship with whoever took it over, pressed between the pages of one of the watertribe history tomes he bought for Katara.
Then he remembers that ship was blown up by pirates, taking the precious memories of those moments with it.
Zuko is well aware that life happens wherever he is, he's felt its hand at his throat enough times. The one time he wanted it, screamed for its choking grasp or careless slap of cosmic punishment in the shape of a lightning bolt, it ignored his cries. Leaving him alone, it knew like it always does, was the cruellest punishment it could inflict.
It inflicts that same indifference now, marooning him in Ba Sing Se. You want to make Agni laugh, tell him your plans.
The bitter sentiment sustains the low flame of Zuko's irritation as he wipes down the same table he's already cleaned four times this evening. Seriously, do the people of Ba Sing Se actually drink the tea or use it to water the dead wood of his tables?
The irritation spikes again when a familiar, shaggy mess of brown hair strides into the tea shop like he owns the place. Zuko thought dismissing Jet at the train station was the last he'd see of the slickly charismatic young man. At the time he felt bad about it. Regrets find each other, Zuko thinks, the men who hold them wretched vessels of bad choices. Self-sustaining pools of misery.
Making a mistake is forgivable. Only people who know what it means to choose wrong know it can't be so easily washed away.
He recognised wounds similar to his own scars across the boy's soul. Those and an empty stomach forged an easy, if fleeting, bond between them, strengthened by full stomachs after working together on the ferry.
Dismissing Jet's offer at the train station wasn't as easy as he'd made it seem. He's starting over, his Uncle's way, and joining something as anarchist sounding as 'Freedom Fighters' doesn't bring to Zuko's mind the simple honour of poverty his Uncle plans for them. And, truthfully, he had to get away.
He saw the three of them together on the ferry: Jet, Long-Shot and Smellerbee. They're friends, life-long if he trusts his gut. Easy together in a way Zuko would only intrude upon. He watched how Long-Shot soothed the girls wounded sense of self after his Uncle's comment, and it laid bare his own wounds of Katara. He'd never be able to lighten her day with something as simple as his presence, a smile, a hand on the shoulder.
He couldn't ruin the Freedom Fighters like he'd ruined her.
What he didn't count on was Jet's persistence. While yet to bring up the offer again, the lanky youth has made it his mission to stop in at the shop every day. Today, as he's done countless times before, Jet waltzes in as the late afternoon crowd becomes the evening after-workers and heads to a table near the back.
Zuko doesn't even need to look up anymore. At first, he assumed Jet got a job nearby and this was the closest place to grab a drink once he finished work. Zuko would have taken him for a drinker of harder stuff than tea, but he wasn't going to throw away the chance at some extra tips.
And then Jet came up short one day for his usual cup of Jasmine blend, looking so embarrassed Zuko pretended he'd counted it wrong and let him scurry away. He pretends he doesn't notice a lot of what Jet does. Like how he'll watch him and his Uncle, long past when the usual post shift whistle-wetter's return to their families. Sometimes he's there until closing, slouching back in his booth. Cocksure and comfortable, he'll salute Zuko whenever he passes with the cup he's been nursing so long it must have gone cold, always with a look Zuko can't decipher.
As if he's set an invisible wire across the floor and is waiting for Zuko to take one wrong step and trip.
If the kid was so desperate for a job, Zuko's sure his Uncle could put in a good word for him. Until then, it wasn't his problem. He's not sticking his neck out to Pao and risking his job just because the Freedom Fighter's too proud to ask.
He can feel the boy's eyes on him as he folds his rag back into his apron. Why does he even bother? Rag, apron and table are all so dirty he's just smearing pattens of grime at this point, thinking about waves swirling and tides breaking. Agni, he's gone from regret into full-blown pining. The pity party needs to stop. Trouble is, everything around him is so mind-numbingly dull, what else is there to think about?
Tea? It's all just hot leaf juice to him.
Firebending forms? He may not like his life at the moment, but he's not suicidal.
Happy childhood memories to look back on fondly?
Spirits, he needs a hobby.
He straightens up from his labour. Immediately, Pao seats three new patrons. Their dust caked hands land on the wet table surface, creating films across their bare arms that they hardly seem to notice as they laugh over whatever unimportant mishaps entertain them enough to make it through their shifts. Zuko notices, mentally cataloguing the cricks he'll have in his spine by the end of the night.
Agni, give him a legitimate reason to smack one of these customers. Spirits, send him the ugliest, most annoying angel ever shit out of heaven to justify it. Maybe he can accidentally bonk one on the head with his tray when no one's looking.
Firebending drills are easier than mastering his facial expressions. Pao catches him glaring at the mess the new customers are making of the table before he can school his features. "Get those dirty cups out of my customers view," he says tightly.
Zuko knows he would have been fired weeks ago if not for Uncle. Pao doesn't know how lucky he is, but he's catching on quick to how talented Iroh is with tea. Yelling at the nephew of the best brewer he's ever likely to have, even with their desperation, is too much of a risk to the rising star his shop is becoming.
Yes, Zuko could have a better attitude, but the continued, "This is the best tea in the Lower Ring!" Rapidly graduating to, "Best tea in the whole city!" Means Zuko gets to sulk and glower at his job as much as the spirits damn well please.
"The secret ingredient is love," he catches his Uncle saying as he twirls through the steam of a fresh brew. It's sharp with the ginger he added to Pao's grocery list ("Properly dried, Pao. Even I cannot brew with lumps of sawdust, and I certainly won't serve it to the good paying people of this city."). All Zuko can smell is his life being poured down the drain with the dregs of tea he scrapes from the dirty cups.
He's coming out, tray tucked under one arm, but is stopped short by Jet standing at the counter. Not where the customers sometimes come to place an order or speak to Pao, but at the folding divider the serves go through to reach the kitchen.
He was waiting for him. "Lee, can I talk to you?"
Zuko gets the prickling sensation as Jet's eyes pin him down. Not that he'll trip on the wire this time. More like he's walking along it, dangling precariously, and he feels danger on whatever side he may fall.
"I'm on the clock," he tries to brush him off. "Pao just let in two more tables. I need to-"
Jet flicks a copper coin at him. It thuds against his apron, dropping into his open palm. "Jasmine blend, now sit."
Zuko glances over to his boss. The skinny man is normally especially observant when Zuko's out on the tearoom floor, keeping his civil leash tight. Just his luck he's distracted by something Uncle says, the two men laughing together right when Zuko could use an excuse to move on.
He slides opposite Jet, feeling his neck prickle even more now his back is to the door. He hates any situation where he can't see the whole room. He tries not to show how exposed he feels, waiting for Jet to get a move on with what he wants.
"How's it going for you?" Jet takes Zuko's blank look in stride. "In the city?"
Taken aback, Zuko shrugs. "Fine."
Jet raises an eyebrow.
"Can't complain." Right, social expectations. "What about you?"
"Getting by." Jet waves at the air between them. "But I'm already Earth Kingdom. Must be hard for you, being so far from home?"
"Not as bad as you'd think," Zuko says, carefully not agreeing or disagreeing. Agni, what story has he already given Jet? "Dirt under the nails and dirt on the ground's all the same, right?"
Jet hums, nodding. "I suppose it is. But you've landed on your feet. Your uncle's brewing the best tea in the city."
Zuko relaxes as they venture back into safer waters. "Don't remind me. At least you don't go home stinking like wet leaf juice."
"He must be really good at controlling flames," Jet says like he never heard Zuko's attempt at humour. It hangs in the air between them, Zuko's pulse jackhammering in his neck the longer it goes on. "For the tea vats."
He fights the urge to sigh in relief. "He's always loved tea and he's old. Practice makes perfect. Speaking of, I really need to get back to work."
He attempts to slide out of the booth, but Jet's leg snaps out. His foot plants into the wood by Zuko's hip, blocking his escape. "We're not done talking."
Zuko's heart is in his throat. Still, he manages a frustrated growl. "Yes, we are. My boss is watching."
He isn't, but Jet will have to twist and unpin Zuko from the booth with those glittering, triumphant eyes if he checks. "I've been watching this place for weeks. I'm tired of waiting, Lee."
Under the table Zuko grips the bench to keep the sweat from boiling off his palms. Jet's own hand rises. Zuko watches it like the mouse watches the cat. It's heading towards one of his hook swords.
"I didn't want to do this here, but you've left me no cho-"
He cuts himself off, entire face going slack. The menace flees. Fingers about to grab the hilt of his sword freeze mid-air. Zuko, awkward at guessing what he should say at the best of times, is utterly flummoxed by Jet's abrupt speechlessness.
Either way, Jet was pushing towards a precipice. Startling him now might end up with both of them tumbling over the edge. "Look, Jet... if you're really this desperate, maybe ask my boss later about a job."
Jet blinks, seeming not to hear him. His eyes are beyond Zuko, something over his shoulder.
"I'm sure Uncle could put in a word with Pao."
Jet's eyes snap back into focus. "Oh, no. It's nothing like that." A little jerkily, the rising hand drops lower to scratch the back of his head.
Zuko's getting too paranoid. Being a wanted traitor by one home and a wanted criminal in another will do that. Still, his gut is screaming to know. He can't deal in speculations. "So, what's this about?"
Jet's still got most of his attention on the door. Zuko would turn to look but he's too invested in what almost happened at the booth. He needs to know. "Uh, oh you wouldn't believe it. One of Pao's rivals offered Smellerbee twenty silver pieces if we could get a sample of your uncle's tea to them."
Zuko's remaining eyebrow quirks. "We offer a takeaway service. Pao's considering expanding into mobile deliveries in this district if business keeps up."
"Get it out as far as you can, right?" But Jet's barely looking at him now. He stands abruptly, leaving Zuko to gape up at him.
"What about your tea?" Zuko fumbles into his apron for the copper piece. "At least take your money-"
"I gotta get going. Good chatting to ya."
Zuko twists half around as Jet hurries past. He pauses just outside the doorway, looking left, looking right, as if searching for someone. Long-shot? Smellerbee? Lost love of the past? Whoever they were they're gone now. Jet wanders off into the night, sheet white as if he saw a ghost.
With a deep sigh Zuko hauls himself back onto his feet. He waits on the two new tables, Pao shooting him a stern look between trips for taking so long. When the first lot clear out he's too busy to clean up and set out the new placement, so Pao has to. He'll get another earful for that when they close.
His feet hurt. He hasn't stopped sweating since Jet trapped him in the booth. Where they were from. How Uncle tends the vats... What was Jet really asking? It consumes Zuko so much, he's barely paying attention as he approaches the fresh table. A brunette in long light green robes with her back to him sits alone.
"Welcome to Pao's family Tea House." There's a lengthy opener about every guest being treated like family that Zuko is too fed up to prattle through. "What do you want?"
"Whatever the Dragon of the West has on special."
His pencil freezes halfway through the Dragon. The girl's breath catches when he looks up from his notepad, catching a full view of his face. She's the only girl in the world he knows who wouldn't gasp because of his scar.
Katara.
"You're really..." she breathes, head shaking ever so slightly in disbelief. "It is you."
Her hair isn't in its usual braid. It's piled on top of her head in some twisting, bundled Earth Kingdom style, and she's not wearing her usual blue tunic and leggings. In fact, everything about her is Earth Kingdom. The green dress is formal, flat, and long. It does nothing to compliment the full figure underneath. Dark green beads accentuate her neckline, matching the ones braided into her hair. He's barely paying attention to any of it though. Beneath the plum lipstick, and blush, and kohl combination offering her cheekbones a delicate curve, those blue eyes, eyes which have haunted him for months, stare up at him.
The moon would be jealous, he thinks out of nowhere. He's too stunned to blush.
Her mouth opens. "You're-"
"Not here," he cuts her off, sparing a furtive glance towards the middle of the shop. Pao and Uncle are hamming it up with some regulars. Neither's noticed what's going on at the back. When he looks at Katara again, she's followed his line of sight. "He's happy... Please."
She nods and pretends the peruse the menu.
Every bit of training Zuko has takes his composure to the kitchen, fetches a cup of who even knows, and takes it back to Katara. She tries to get his attention, but he's already moving for his Uncle.
"I'm going to take my break now."
Pao frowns. Zuko really should be saying it to him. Uncle, while not knowing of the dread and unease roiling through his nephew, can feel it in Zuko. "Of course, nephew." His eyes flick to Katara's profile, thankfully only able to see a made-up Earth Kingdom woman. They slide slyly back to his. "Take mine as well."
Choosing to ignore Uncle's raised eyebrows, Zuko drags his feet back to the booth. He stands awkwardly, unsure where to place his hands, where to look. Where would she want him? Probably a thousand miles away, a thousand lifetimes from her. But it seems fate has whittled their choices down to this moment, forcing her hand to gesture for him to take a seat and for him to have no choice but to take it.
He slides opposite her. At least his back isn't to the door this time. He doubts he could get through whatever's about to happen if he were that agitated. He still might not. "You look nice."
"I can't turn up to the Earth King's palace in my parkas, not that much came of it." Her manicured eyebrow raises, but his discomfort's pitiful enough for her to let it slide. "You have hair."
He scrubs a hand through the short black hair. "Thanks…" Needing something to do with his hands, he taps his thumbs together. "Itches sometimes."
"What are you doing here, Zu-"
"Lee." He shoots a look around. They're relatively sequestered up near the back of the shop. Across the parlour, Uncle is the life of the evening patrons. No one's paying the scruffy tea server or the beautiful woman he's trying to talk to any attention. "I'm Lee, now."
"Okay, Lee." Her nose wrinkles like the name tastes bad to say. "How long have you been in Ba Sing Se?"
It's not the question she was going to ask, but with time to think while he worked, he's not sure what's calculation and what's the remains of shock. He's still stumped, stammering his way through his answers. "A few weeks. Maybe a month. Uncle and I came in on the ferry after making our way through the Earth Kingdom since… since the North Pole."
Her expression darkens. "I'm aware."
Right, the town. Azula. Throwing fire at the hand reaching for his injured Uncle. Even after everything he's done, she offered her help. He clenches his scarred fist, knowing exactly what he could have done to her in reckless grief.
She offers nothing but the scepticism carving marks through her normally soft, open face. "I'm glad he's okay."
"I should never have-"
But she's not interested in what he has to say on the past. There's too much of their history carving craters out of the roads they've walked to bring them here. "And you got a job here?"
"Pretty quick, yeah." He's stumbling to keep up with her direct questions. "Uncle sniffed Pao's bad tea out, made it better and, well, yeah."
He spreads his hands plaintively over the table, encompassing all his boredom, misery, and confusion in the gesture.
What is she doing in the city? Is she still with the Avatar? Have they found an Earthbending teacher for him? Is that why they're here? He's desperate to ask all of these questions. He's even more desperate to get out of this conversation with his cover intact. Tension works its way along his shoulders, begging for him to hunch down, scurry away and hide like he's been doing for the last six months. But if Katara senses even an ounce of dishonesty, he doesn't doubt she'll take it straight to the civil police.
Or the Dai Li.
His blood goes cold.
With refugees overflowing into the Lower Rim, the Cultural Police's presence on the streets has increased. They lurk at shop fronts, the mouths of alleys, and at all public stops and gatherings. Their reputation is well known among the Earth Kingdom citizens enough that even the new entries know not to mention the war which drove them from their homes. Wanting to draw as little attention to himself as possible, Zuko followed the example. But the few attempts he's made at small talk, enquiring to new patrons on what's going on with them, what brought them to the city, was received with enough hostility for him to get the message.
There is no war in Ba Sing Se.
There's no exiled Prince of the War Mongers in Ba Sing Se, either. Zuko would like it to stay that way.
"I believe you," Katara finally decides on. "Because I know you've been in the city."
His mouth falls open. "You-"
"Saw you, last week." And he believes her, if the rehearsed note to her words, how she's controlling the conversation, is anything to go by. "And since then, I've been agonising over whether I should turn you over to the Dai Li."
Fear coats his tongue like ash. "Why haven't you?"
The question cracks the cool mask she wears. She must have expected him to ask, yet for the first time her eyes flick away from his. She's worried, he realises. Her preparation has done nothing to ease her own nerves. And the old impulse to reach out and take her hand is still there. He crushes it down.
Calm is at least stable. But cornered and thrown off guard can turn even the most trained and steady of warriors into a desperate beast. She finds his eyes again, holding them like she holds onto her own courage. "A friend vouched for you."
He doesn't have any friends.
From her green sleeve, Katara produces a rumpled flower. Purple petals are barely holding on to the wrinkled, bent stem, so battered it looks like someone tried to ring out the pollen by hand like he wrings out his sodden cleaning towel.
He looks down at it dumbly, and she watches him watching it. Is he supposed to react? Does it mean something? Should he recognise it? The colouring is more vibrant than the deep purple of the Frost Irises of her home. Even so, he never showed the flower he saved to her. Why would a purple one of another name mean anything?
His silence seems to answer something for Katara, however. Nodding an unspoken affirmative to herself, she slips the flower back into her sleeve. "This friend told me you were in the city. They wanted me to find you, so I have to believe it wasn't because your uncle makes the best Jasmine honey tea in the city."
Zuko's still stuck on the mystery flower.
"What I can't figure out is why." Katara leans her elbows on the table so she can pick her cup up with two hands. It's no longer steaming. "Why would they vouch for you? Why would they want me to know?"
"Can I at least know who this friend of yours is?" Zuko asks.
Katara finishes her sip. "They prefer to remain anonymous."
"Hm," he grunts, displeased. "Well, I suppose I can't begrudge someone that," he says, trying for light-hearted.
"I'm asking you, now," she says, point blank.
He doesn't know what she wants him to say. Then he remembers Katara's possibly the only person alive besides Uncle who's never wanted anything from him. And with all that's gone wrong to sever that connection, she's here, now, going against her better judgement to give him the benefit of the doubt.
"I don't want to capture the- Aang, that's his name, right? I'm done with that life, and it wants nothing to do with me. You saw it yourself in that town. Azula attacked me too. As far as the Fire Nation is concerned their Prince is a disgrace, dead, or better of that way." Every word is a knife to his heart, twisting with each note of truth it wrings from his wounded spirit. "Uncle and I came here for a fresh start. We're not-" he remembers to lower his voice just in time, so wrapped up in begging her for his new life. "-we're not Fire Nation anymore. Not Zuko and Iroh. We're tea servers now, trying to find a life like the rest of the refugees here."
Katara's always had a quick face. Quick to smirk, to smile, to laugh. It softens now, the hard edge dulling the deeper it carves into his pride. There was so little of it left. "How am I supposed to believe you?"
He's done a lot of things to her, but he's never lied. It's petty and unreasonable, but what's left of him that feels is hurt she doesn't trust him.
"You might not believe me. But what about him?" Zuko twists so they can both see his Uncle smile as he claps a customer on the shoulder, head thrown back in laughter. When he turns back, Katara's still watching, and he lets her. Lets her drink in the image like the customers drink the love Iroh infuses into every cup. "I can't ruin this for him."
Her eyes dart from Iroh to him, narrowing. "And you think I will? That I want to?"
"N-no. I-"
"Your Nation takes everything from mine, and you assume I immediately want to pay that back?"
"No!" He shoots a look around. "Katara, please."
Her indignation falls away as if it never even existed. "The old you would have challenged me to an Agni Kai for making such baseless accusations."
He's exhausted trying to keep up with her, slumping over the table. "You're killing me, here, Katara. If that's what you want then I'll go with you now, just please don't drag Uncle into this."
"And break his heart?" She smiles sadly as she shakes her head. Squeezing her eyes shut, she fights an unseen battle Zuko can't decipher in the span of three seconds, then opens them to look at him. "I can't take you at your word, but…"
Her holding on to the end of the sentence flares an echo of hope in his chest. "But...?"
She shakes her head again. "We're not here for you, but I can't… You're not safe," she says, mostly to herself. What she means he has no idea, but he's not so delusional as to believe she's worried about him. It's not his wellbeing she's concerned with, but his freedom. What he could do off the leash in such a big city.
Whatever conclusion she comes to, she doesn't share it with him. He only knows she arrives at one at all by the shuttering of her quick face. Neutral once more, she makes to stand. "You really don't want trouble?"
He stands with her, backing up when she makes to move past him and almost falling into a customer's lap at the table behind him. "Trouble's the last thing I want."
She opens her mouth to respond before remembering they're not alone, that ears could be listening. "We'll see."
He watches her until she's out the door, disappearing into Ba Sing Se's night.
He's counting on it.
The last of the customers filter out deep into Ba Sing Se's evening. The sky is pitch beyond the high walls but inside swirls with the hums and deep orange artificial glow of an evening awakened. Zuko's no stranger to it, now or in the past. He'd watch the Caldera shift from its daytime slumber of neutrality and respectable commerce to a world reminiscent to the poetic vagrancy of a circus. Music would fill the summer night markets, a tune befitting any mood a man of the Fire Nation might have. From a brooding crown prince missing his mother, right down to the lowliest smoker twirling a girl somewhere secret.
In fact, it was those stark nights at sea, pushing deeper into the South Pole, nothing but the stars to light his way in the dark, where Zuko truly experienced the night for the fist time in his life. So many years wasted confusing an evening with the true contentment of being a speck within the true vastness of existence.
There's a pure magic to both. Being surrounded by so many, so much, or nothing at all. Knowing the moment will be, leaving with nothing but memories to prove it ever existed. Experiencing it with others, or lost in that point where the ocean meets the sky.
Uncle sweeps while Zuko stacks cups. The day hasn't worn on him like it did his Uncle, who offers to help Zuko when he finishes on the parlour floor.
"You go on ahead," Zuko says without looking up from his task.
A shadow falls in front of the uniform stacks of cups. "Do you want to talk about what happened today, nephew?" Any attempt Zuko makes to pretend he's too focused on his work is ignored. "I saw Miss Katara leaving. I know seeing her must bring up a lot of confusing feelings, but I'm sure talking about it over tea will help."
"We've been around tea all day, Uncle," Zuko says. "I'm sick of tea, and I don't want to talk about anything either." Which is at least true.
"Sick of tea? That's like saying you're sick of breathing," Uncle chuckles. Moods from his nephew are nothing he isn't used to. "Are you sure?"
"I'm sure," Zuko says, probably too quickly. He sets down the cup he's about to stack and looks up. Uncle's eyes are crinkled permanently at the edges, smile lines carving deep. But concern shines from those deep amber depths. "I'm tired, Uncle. Today was a lot. Could you go on ahead while I finish here? I just want to eat and go to sleep."
Uncle's brow creases, before he reaches out to grip Zuko's shoulder. "New days don't often bring new things like we're led to believe. More often, they bring old things into a new light."
"Except we'll be back here, so nothing new there." He lets Uncle know it's a joke with a wobbly smile. "You go on ahead. I can lock up."
Uncle tilts his head. "That… is good to hear, nephew. Very good. And good things will come from it, I promise."
He squeezes but departs without another word. Zuko waits until he's gone to breath and take up his task once more, this time with the actual speed stacking takes. He'd been going slow on purpose, and less than a minute after his Uncle departs the shop, Zuko's pulling off his apron, locking the door, and slipping down the street.
Ba Sing Se is all too content to ignore him as he heads away from the Tea Shop and their apartment. Still, he's used to moving with the shadows, used to having his face covered and feeling safe wrapped in their darkness. So, he clings to the walls of the growing warehouse district the Lower Ring is slowly building, desperate to increase their industrial value. Whether it's through storage, deliveries, or labour. They'll never match Fire Nation technologies, not unless they drop their protests and finally let the industrial rulers into their cities.
Fat chance, Zuko thinks and, honestly, after what he's seen he can't blame them their stubbornness. Only after they're shown the light will they understand what they've been denying themselves. For now, he thanks them not for the economic climate they drag themselves towards, but the cover it provides.
Finally, he finds the right one, all so faceless in the dark. Built to hold slabs of giant stone which are shipped out to the wall whenever it needs maintenance, the factory went bust after a rivalling businessman opened up three factories closer to the Middle wall. It's currently awaiting the go ahead to transition into grain holding, if the Earth King ever gets round to signing off on the citizen outreach programs.
Until then, it remains unused.
Rubble crunches under Zuko's feet as he tentatively makes his way across the factory floor. He doesn't dare light his way, walking with his hands out in front of him so he doesn't accidentally walk headlong into the few pillars of stone left over when the stock was bought out for two silver pieces to the gold they were actually worth.
And Zuko thought the Fire Nation could be ruthless.
At the zenith of the staircase to the upper level, a single oil lamp burns. It's Zuko's beacon to follow. She's here already.
His heart hammers, but it's too late to back out now. She wouldn't have come without insurance. Whether it's waiting for him in the old foreman's office or outside, he can't take the chance. So, he climbs, wincing when a step underfoot lets out a long creak. As answer, the office door swings open. No one comes out. It's an invitation. A challenge.
He takes it, striding into the room. He curses himself for not changing out of his work clothes before coming here when one sleek dark eyebrow raises in the face of the woman lounging in the chair across the room.
"You were right."
A disappointed tsk slaps him in the face. "No greeting? Banishment's really done nothing for your manners."
"I could have stood you up."
A long finger sparks to life. The eyes above glitter triumphantly as they take him in. Two amber pools of cunning, like a flame through glass. They offer no warmth for their little family reunion. "No, I don't think you could."
He grits his teeth. "The Waterbender came to the shop, just like you said."
The hand not holding the flame drums against a desk shrouded in gloom. It grates against his nerves. "Of course, she did. And?"
Zuko folds his arms over his chest. "And you're going to tell me what that means before I agree to this scheme of yours."
"Scheme?" She would sound genuinely offended if there was anything genuine to her. "Is that really what you think of my brilliant plan? Zuzu, by summers end, Ba Sing Se will be in the palm of our hand. All thanks to you."
The flame brightens, encompassing the smooth pale skin of the hand which holds it. Above the flickering swirl of blue, Azula grins.
You are allowed to call me mean for leaving you there for a week, I completely understand.
Please let me know your thoughts and feedback because I would love to know if I'm doing a good job! it would be greatly appreciated! The input of my readers is incredibly valuable to me!
Kudos always welcome, likes, dislikes, comments and complaints. Let me know what you guys think because I love reading them and finding out about you guys!