Finding Balance
Summary: After the Fire Nation caused a century long war-torn world, it is up to the Avatar and his friends to bring back peace and balance to the world, and their own hearts. AU Avatar world. Heavily based on the series with slightly different interactions and more than what the show incorporated. Zutara, Sukka, Taang, Mai-Lee. Mature themes: sex, language, gory detailing. TW: torture, suicidal thoughts, severe depression, eating disorder.
AN: There is a lot of dialog the is from the show. I wanted the story to read in such a way that it was familiar and reminiscent of the show, while giving different perspectives and filling in some blanks. I also wanted to age up the show a little bit, so as time progresses the themes may get darker. I am very open to constructive criticism and look forward to any and all reviews. Thank you!
Chapter 1: The Western Air Temple
Zuko scaled the cliff up to the Western Air Temple, where he knew the Avatar and his friends were staying. Well, he was attempting to, anyway. He was sweating from nervousness, and every 10 feet or so he would change his mind about continuing on this crazy mission. The voices and laughter of the others could be heard throughout the valley below, and Zuko steeled himself against giving up. He had to see this out. As he reached the open entryway, he thanked Agni that they had not returned just yet, and he sat at the fountain, trying to find the right words even now.
Aang descended, closing his glider and landed gracefully in the temple plaza, and responded to Sokka asking to discuss their plans for the future, "Okay! We can talk about that while I show you the giant pai sho table!" Aang directed, trying to avoid the conversation again, "OH! And, you're going to LOVE the all-day echo chamber!" He finished excitedly, ready to lead the other three further into the temple.
"I think that will have to wait," Toph interrupted, before pointing behind her. Appa began to move and revealed Zuko from his hiding place. Katara, Aang, and Sokka's faces fell into looks of disgust and frustration, they were prepared to fight. Toph, not having been part of the group during Zuko's obsessive stalking-phase, was less concerned by Zuko's presence.
"Hello, Zuko here!" He started, lamely. The group all fell into fighting stances, ready for anything, except what came next. "Hey, I heard you guys flying around down there, so I just thought I'd wait for you here," he continued, while shrugging. Without hesitation, Appa walked straight up to Zuko, growled in happiness and licked him from toe to face multiple times. "I know you must be surprised to see me here," he tried to start again, wiping Sky-Bison spit from his face.
"Not really, since you've followed us all over the world," Sokka interrupted, everyone missing Aang's confusion. Why did Appa trust Zuko? That was odd.
Losing confidence, Zuko responded, "Right…Well, uh, anyway… What I wanted to tell you.. about… is that I've changed," he gathered courage and speed as he continued to talk, "and, I, uh, I'm good now, and I think I should join your group. Oh! And, I can teach firebending, to you," he gestured to Aang, adding the last bit as a seeming after-thought. At this, Aang began to drop his stance, and loosened his grip on his glider.
Katara, having been manipulated by Zuko before, was not buying it. "See, I uh," Zuko tried to continue, before being interrupted once again.
"You want to what now?" Toph asked, incredulously.
"You can't possibly think that any of us would trust you, can you?" Katara asserted, "I mean, how stupid do you think we are?" She fumed.
"Yeah! All you've ever done is try to hunt us down and capture Aang." Sokka added.
Grasping for an answer, Zuko sputtered, "I've done some good things!" He insisted, "I mean I could've stolen your bison in Ba Sing Se, but I set him free. That's something!" And, as if to confirm it, Appa licked Zuko again.
Toph was beginning to buy into it, "Appa does seem to like him." She decided, not feeling any form of dishonesty coming from Zuko, but the group continued to distrust the Fire prince. Sokka suggested that Zuko probably just coated himself in honey and refused to accept anything good could come from their old nemesis.
Zuko attempted to take responsibility for his past wrongdoings, but was shot down immediately as the group threw several of his horrible actions in his face. Accepting these truths, he started up again, "Look, I admit I've done some awful things. I was wrong to try to capture you, and I'm sorry that I attacked the Water Tribe," and before he could stop himself, he blurted out, "and I never should've sent that fire nation assassin after you. I'm going to try to stop him."
This came as a complete shock to the group, "WAIT! YOU SENT COMBUSTION MAN AFTER US?" Sokka began to advance with boomerang in hand, and Zuko continued to stumble on his words, "Oh! Sorry!" Sokka apologized sarcastically before continuing on his rant,"I didn't mean to insult your friend!"
"He's not my friend!" Zuko insisted. This is where he lost even Toph's support, as she shouted about how not-named-Combustion-Man had thrown them in jail and attemted to kill all of them. He closed his eyes in shame, before realizing the Avatar had yet to respond in any way, "Why aren't you saying anything? You once said you thought we could be friends."
Aang remembered sitting in the forest after escaping from Zhao's prison with Zuko, but the fireball thrown at him as a response was the sealing factor. "You know I have good in me," Zuko implored. Aang looked to his friends, Sokka shaking his head. Toph's face rigid with frustration, but still seeming unsure. Katara's unforgiving and piercing stare, never leaving Zuko's face. And, he came to a conclusion.
"There's no way we can trust you after everything you've done. We'll never let you join us." The prince's eyebrows shot skyward and his heart dropped through the floor at the airbender's harsh words. Katara insisted he leave. Now.
But, he refused to give up, "I'm trying to explain that I'm not that person anymore," he raised his voice, moving forward, only to be stopped in his tracks as Sokka moved forward threateningly. He still was unswayed, he had to find a way to show loyalty. "If you won't accept me as a friend, then maybe you'll take me as a prisioner." He kneeled.
He was met with a resounding "NO" and wave thrown by Katara, "Leave and don't come back. And, if we ever see you again, you won't get the chance to walk away again." Sokka took another step forward, and Zuko decided it was time to retreat and try again in some other way.
As he left, the Gaang began to feel less fear and more annoyance. "Why would he try to fool us like that?" Katara voiced, incensed that he would try his stupid tricks on her again. She was a smart young woman. She only needed to make a mistake once to know she should never make it again. Sokka suggested that Zuko wanted to lead them into a trap, and Katara shared what happened in the catacombs in Ba Sing Se, she thought back to the pain in his eye and the brokenness of his voice and her anger flared. How dare he be so conniving. He tried to use her trauma to manipulate her. He knew nothing of what it was like to lose a mother, not like she did. Sokka came to the same conclusion, and began to echo her thoughts, and as ashamed as she was to admit it, Zuko had gotten to her. She had fully believed he was confused and hurting, and she wanted desperately to help him. At this point, she couldn't tell what she felt more upset about, that he lied to her, or that she felt stupid believing him, or that he could've been telling the truth and still chose to help his sister kill Aang.
Aang took his turn to reveal his own memory of a different Zuko, where the Blue Spirit freed him from a fire nation prison, at great peril to himself, "He risked his life to save me," the Avatar stated. But the sibling would hear none of it, convinced that Zuko only saved Aang to later capture him, himself.
"And what was all that crazy stuff about setting Appa free? What a liar!" Katara asserted, incensed.
"Actually," Toph interjected, "he wasn't lying." But Sokka downplayed this too, spouting something about being nice to animals at least. Toph was beginning to get frustrated, everyone was missing the point, "I'm just saying, that considering his messed-up family and how he was raised, he could've turned out a lot worse." Again, the siblings were too hotheaded to accept this explanation as anything more than an excuse, "All I know is, that while he was talking to us, he was sincere. Maybe you're all just letting your hurt feelings keep you from thinking clearly."
Katara was instantly offended, as was Sokka and Aang, "Why would you even try to defend him?" Katara shouted.
Losing her temper, Toph threw her fist down and tensed her whole body, "Because, Katara, you're all ignoring one crucial fact!" She moved close to the avatar and pointed at him aggressively, "Aang needs a Firebending teacher. We can't think of a SINGLE person in the world to do the job. Now one shows up on a silver platter and you won't even think about it?" She accentuated the final words by stomping her feet.
Feeling slightly taken back, Katara silently looked at Aang for a decision, "I'm not having Zuko as my teacher." And, that was that. She growled out frustrated, "UH! I'm really beginning to wonder who's the blind one around here."
Toph stomped off to go find Zuko. She was going to prove the rest of the group wrong. People weren't always what they seemed. She knew Iroh loved Zuko, and a man that kind and wise wouldn't love a monster. She had to find out for herself.
Katara decided to go lay down after the whole confrontation, choosing to let the boys go off to see the giant pai sho table without her. She began to think back to that moment in the catacombs, as she unleashed all of her hatred for the fire nation on Zuko. How his voice dropped to nearly a whisper, "They took my mom from me, too."
She shook her head, angry tears coming to her eyes, but the memory continued without her permission, in bits and pieces. She saw flashes of pain in his eye, caressing his scar-ridden cheek, getting impossibly close to the man she had envisioned as the face of "the enemy" for so long. She cringed and slammed her eyes shut, curling into fetal position, with the intensity of embarrassment and shame as she saw the last flash before the old man and Aang came busting through the ceiling, she felt his hot breath flitter across her own lips, her toes involuntarily bringing them closer together.
Katara slapped her face and sat straight up. This wasn't happening. She wasn't angry because she was so convinced by that traitor, she was angry at him for being so manipulative or weak-spirited. She didn't know which was more disgusting, but it certainly wasn't that they had almost kissed. That had nothing to do with it. Ridiculous.
After returning to the Gaang, feet burned, Toph tried to explain to the group what had happened. They all decided it was time to do something about Zuko. They all were chatting around the fountain, when a large explosion happened right above their heads. Aang and Sokka immediately sprang into action, grabbing Toph and moving her out of harm's way.
Zuko attempted to intercept the assassin, attacking the cyborg, threatening to not pay, offering to pay double, but never allowing Combustion Man to get a good shot at the Avatar and his friends. Even if they would not accept him, he refused to allow his past mistakes continue. He fought the man, to no avail, but the group below heard and saw his efforts. They waited with baited breath as the assassin took aim at Zuko and waited for the cloud of rubble to clear. Did he die? No! Aang noticed he was hanging from a vine. "Figures," Sokka whispered smarmily.
Now that Zuko was out of the picture, the group began mounting their own defense. Aang thrust a tornado in their attacker's direction, but he just jumped right over it. Katara raised and froze a large wave, shattering it into tiny daggers of ice, all aimed in his direction, but he shielded himself with his metal arm and leg. This at least gave them all time to relocate to a safer area. "I can't get an angle on him!" Katara panicked.
Sokka's face lit up, "I know how to get an angle on him!" He said before throwing his boomerang and catching Combustion Man right in the third eye. Just as Zuko was climbing to the ledge, he noticed the man preparing to fire once more, "NOOOOO!" He screamed out, but to his surprise, the explosion was not projected and he watched as bits of rubble, bone, and metal all fell to valley below. He continued to climb to safety. He decided it was time to face them once more. If to do nothing else than apologize to the little earth bender and accept his own fate.
As he trudged into the plaza for the second time in two days, he prepared himself for rejection or the possibility of an attack. What he didn't expect was for the Avatar to show gratitude, but he hid his surprise well. "Listen, I know I didn't explain myself very well yesterday. I've been through a lot in the past few years, and it's been hard. But, I'm realizing that I had to go through all of those things, to learn the truth. I thought I had lost my honor and that somehow my father could return it to me. But I know now that no one can give you your honor. It's something you earn for yourself by choosing to do what's right."
"All I want now, is to play my part in ending this war," he begged, his eyes wide and pleading. He looked down before continuing, "And I know my destiny is to help you restore balance to the world." He apologized to Toph, bowing respectfully. He explained that fire is dangerous, and that he needed to be more controlled to prevent hurting those he cared about.
At this statement, Aang's eyes and heart opened wide. He recalled how he had burned Katara. The pain he felt from causing someone he loved so much pain fueled his resolve to learn from the fire prince. "I'd like you to teach me," he requested, as he bowed to Zuko.
Toph was excited to have Zuko in the group, and the rest of the group accepted Zuko, albeit a little less enthusiastically. "I won't let you down, I promise!"
Katara stealthily followed Sokka and Zuko to the fire bender's new room. She watched as Sokka left the room and walked out to Aang, hearing him say something about it being awkward. But it wasn't JUST awkward for her. She snuck up to the door, to see Zuko beginning to unpack. He was staring lovingly at a tablet, but she couldn't see what was on it. However, his vulnerability didn't sway her even for a moment.
As he noticed her at the door, she barged straight in. "You might have everyone else here buying your transformation, but you and I both know you've struggled with doing the right thing in the past. So let me be clear. You make one step backward, one slip-up, if you give me one reason to think you might hurt Aang, you won't have to worry about your destiny anymore, because I will put an end to your destiny without a second thought." She walked out without waiting for a response and returned to the main plaza, choosing to stay by Aang's side. If Zuko dared to threaten her friend, she would feel no guilt in taking his life.
Zuko sat in his room. He had no doubt the water tribe girl would attack him if she thought Aang was in danger. He also had no doubt that he wouldn't even try to defend himself. What she saw as a threat, he saw as simply a reminder of her tenacity and loyalty. It impressed him, and if he was being honest, frightened him a little.
Speaking of loyalty, he thought about the years he was branded a traitor, for standing up to an official and refusing to fight his father in an Agni Kai. He grimaced thinking of how much it still hurt him that his own father could be so cruel. He thought of how Azula told him in a sing-songy voice, that their father was going to kill him. He thought of how he was so quick to abandon the uncle who truly loved him. He thought of how he left Mai behind with only a letter and no explanation. His family, his blood wasn't even that loyal. He cringed and held his side, feeling the fire within him licking at his chest, burning him from the inside out. He fell into a fitful sleep, and dreamed of the night his mother left him behind.