A/N: Now I'm the villain in your history. Love and be loved. Read… and review!
A Girl
[Winter/Spring 110 AG]
Azula still remembers it so clearly. The helplessness. The panic. The fear. She was drowning and she was chained. The day her entire life changed. Arms locked up behind her back, kneeling on the ground, alone and in the dark, she finds herself in the same position now. Aboard Koh's Disciples' ship, she is in chains again. The only differences today are that she's already in a prison cell, and these men were smart enough to also muzzle her. There would be no breathing fire, and any kind of bending is out of the question.
One of the men enters the room. He leers down at her in the cell. "Ready to meet your maker?"
Azula stares up at him but doesn't respond. This no name soldier would not be the death of her, she is certain. They wouldn't have brought her all this way just to kill her in this cell.
'No. If it was me, I would make a show of it.'
She calculates the length of time in the ship. She thinks about the course they've taken, the smoothness of the seas. They've been docked for thirty minutes or so now. She guesstimates their location.
"What are we doing off the coast of Whaletail Island?"
"We're not off the coast of Whaletail Island, dumb cunt."
"Fine. Gou Island then is it?"
The soldier opens his mouth to rebuttal but stops. That's all the confirmation Azula needs.
"Gou Island it is."
He takes the keys and unlocks her cell door. He steps up and leans down until he's on her eye level. "You've killed a lot of my friends over the years. So if I was you, I'd shut the fuck up before I decide that you had a little accident."
Azula smirks through her muzzle.
"Why don't you tell me their names," she coos at him. "I'll tell you which ones soiled themselves after they died."
The soldier looks at her with a screwy expression. He raises his fist, "Why you little-"
"Reezu."
He freezes in place. Azula leans to the side to look past him. It's the man she had negotiated with before.
"Finally, someone who's in charge."
"Reezu, just collect her. He's waiting."
"Ah, about time. Is this your fabled 'King of Faces?'"
The man named Reezu, gets to work on detaching her chains from the ground. The man from the Kyoshi statue approaches. "You sure are excited. Rushing off to get killed. Chained like a dog. Is this how you imagined dying?"
Reezu finishes his work and forces her to stand up. She looks into the golden eyes of the man before her. She speaks with confidence and malice.
"Tell me, how do you want to die?"
He chuckles at her. She chuckles too. She tells him, "It's funny because I can make it happen. However you want to go, I can do it for you. Quick, drawn out, with fire, buried alive, drowned. However you want. Even painless."
"Awfully generous of you. Too bad you won't be the one to do it," he turns to Reezu. "Let's go."
Her world is shrouded in darkness as black cloth bag is thrown over her head. He pushes her forward and they all set off.
Azula walks blindly for a while. She feels herself going uphill for a long time. Finally Reezu grabs her and holds her steady. He removes the head cover.
All eyes are upon her.
They are at the mouth of a cave. Azula is marched down a sloping hill into it, through a sea of men. Dozens and dozens of them, all of them watching her. Silent and awestruck. As she goes she hears some of them whispering to each other about their disbelief. Surely this couldn't be the Faceless Demon herself. They wonder how she had been captured and why she was on the island in the first place.
All of Koh's Disciples file into the cave. Two men stay behind to stand guard. When the opportunity presents itself, six swift strikes to the back and head disarm them, and knock them out. The grey eyed girl cautiously makes her way down the slope.
Azula is sent tumbling to the ground. The room is roaring with life. She couldn't count them all but if she had to guess it was well north of 100 of them, maybe even more than 200 men. They are in a large clearing in the cave. She is sprawled on the gravel ground, struggling against her chains to fix herself, when a pair of feet come into view.
"What is it you always say again?" A voice speaks to her.
She looks up at the man standing over her. He is bald and dark skinned. His arms are crossed over his chest. He looks down at her with a smug smile.
"Ah yes," he remembers. "Welcome… to where you're going."
She sits herself up on her knees before him. He is buff and his clothes are tattered. If given the whole room to choose, she would not have picked him as the "king." He seems like any other man here, perhaps with more time spent on his body.
"You're the King of Faces? You're big."
"For you." He replies. He shows no emotion as he says, "For a girl."
Furrowing her brow, Azula asks through her muzzle, "'For a girl?' You mean to insult me with that? I'd return the joust if I thought you were a man."
"I've waited a long time for this moment."
Azula twists her head to side so her hair gets out of her face, "It's weird that you spend all this time thinking about me, but I don't even know who you are."
His voice is high pitched for a man so large, as well as oddly raspy. She finds it an odd juxtaposition. He gloats over her. "You rose from nothing like a sunrise. You represent a great power."
She nods her head. He kneels down to look her in the face. "But all power must be challenged, for total power corrupts totally."
He stands back up. "So we too rise, to match you and restore the natural order of the world. Man's place over women. And now, you come to us in chains. We will watch you fade like the sunset. You rose from nothing and to nothing you shall return."
The crowd grows restless. They were patient at first, but they've become louder, making it harder for each person to hear their King's dialogue with the prisoner.
Azula strains to look up at him.
"I assure you, the sun will never set on my Empire," she says confidently. "But with all of my titles, why the 'Faceless Demon?' Why create your own?"
The King of Faces steps back and picks up a broadsword. He grips it tightly and stares at it while he speaks to her. "That was not my decision. My disciples named you that when they realized you could blend into any crowd."
He turns to her finally. "They were convinced that not even Koh could steal your face. As you continued to defy us over the years, the legend only grew."
Azula looks around, trying to establish her surroundings. She continues to bide her time. "So you call yourself the 'King of Faces,' but I am sculpting a world without kings. Without Fire Lord's. Without Avatars. Only woman."
On the perimeter, a single guard with a helmet stands near the exit. He feels a hand cover his mouth. Before he can scream he receives several punches to the back, grows instantly weak, and then a blow to the head knocks him unconscious. He is dragged out of sight before anyone knows what's happened.
"A woman's place is at the feet of men, serving them. As you are now."
Azula smirks. These non-benders have her hands in chains and mouth muzzled to stop her from attacking. Then he goes and talks about feet without even realizing.
"I am at your feet, and I come bearing a gift."
"Oh?"
"Your lives."
"You jest."
"No, it's true," Azula tells him. "I won't kill you, or any of them. All you have to do is let me go, swear fealty to the Dragon Empress, and never touch Kyoshi Island again."
He chuckles. "I had heard legends of your arrogance, but it is all the more stunning in-person."
"Short of this and I will have no choice but to do as I told your clansmen: I will rip your entire clan out. Root and stem." She tells him matter of factly.
He leans in and whispers into her muzzle. "We will bathe in your blood and water our gardens with it."
Azula sits up higher, getting closer to him. "Now send me back home, I have an empire to build. Or you'll scream when you die, like the last King I killed."
A stranger approaches from the side. They move silently and carefully so as to not draw attention, wearing a spiked helmet, and carrying a Labrys.
He shakes his head at her. "I did not believe my men. The Faceless Demon? On Kyoshi Island? Surrendering herself? The only thing I want to know before we kill you is why? Why give yourself up? We will simply eradicate that depleted island once you are gone."
It feels like the entire cave goes silent. All of the audio is sucked out of the room and there is only quiet. She thinks back to the scene beneath the statue. She knew that they could shoot their way out. She knew that her childhood friend would die for them. Azula simply couldn't let that happen. She speaks plainly and truthfully.
"It was for a girl."
The noise returns as the crowd erupts. The Faceless Demon openly admits to gender betrayal in front of 200 conservative Fire Nation zealot men, all with fantasies of killing her and bathing in her blood before that admission. Azula looks all around them as they rouse and jeer, becoming rabid. Somehow, though, the King of Faces is unperturbed.
"Ha! You'd kill yourself just to save her?"
Azula turns back to him. She turns her head to the side and furrows her brow.
"I would," she tells him sincerely. "I'd kill you, myself, her whole village. I'd burn down a thousand villages, and a thousand kings, and a thousand pillagers for her."
The way she says this genuinely scares him. He leans back, away from her. Concerned, he asks her, "Why are you telling us this?"
"Because you asked," Azula says straight away. She smiles through the muzzle. "And because you won't be around to tell it yourself."
He is thoroughly disturbed by this. Of all that he expected from his mortal enemy, this was not something. He tells her, "That's enough."
She has had plenty of time and now she needs to decide her plan of attack. He looks all around him and announces to the room at large, arms waving, "LET'S EXORCISE A DEMON!"
The crowd roars to life. The stranger approaches the center of the room. They find the thinnest collection between them and the prisoner. They're only a few people deep. They can't push through. They back away.
The King of Faces stands back, and positions his broadsword on her shoulder. The cool steel feels nice on her hot skin. She imagines stabbing him with his own blade. The stranger spins their double sided axe in their hands. Azula cycles through all the iterations of how this can go. She has to wait for the exact right moment. Roll onto her back, kick up and burn him alive. He can't move though, she needs him to lift the sword off her shoulders. The stranger doesn't wait. They sprint forward, and just before the crowd they bend at the knees. They launch themselves as high as possible through the air.
"Ahhh!"
They soar over the crowd and land a few feet away. Their momentum carries them forward to close the distance. They raise their labrys. The King reacts quickly, backing away and raising the broadsword to parry the blow. All of the momentum behind them gives them more force than he's ready for. His body twists away from the assailant, who delivers a quick kick to him and sends the King of Faces to the ground. The stranger's helmet tumbles to the ground.
Shooting up and stepping back the King screams, "What the spirits is this? Some trick?"
Azula's head is heavy on her shoulders, but with effort she turns to see her savior. A head full of soft brown hair leads to a twisting, single, braided ponytail. It cascades down her back. Her chest heaves. Glistening with sweat, Ty Lee grips the labrys tighter. She switches positions, dancing backwards. She does a sweeping motion to stand beside Azula.
"Get up," she tells the prisoner. "Quick."
Azula stands beside her childhood friend. She looks at her in astonishment. Somehow, someway, this girl had come to rescue her. She looks at the mechanism blocking her hands. No key. No problem. She holds the labrys in one hand and rears the other back. With a swift strike she cracks the hand block. She rears it back again. The King of Faces looks at the demon girls.
"WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?" He screams. "KILL THEM!"
Ty Lee strikes again, this time the crack is clean. The crowd advances. Ty Lee grips both hands onto the labrys. Azula closes her eyes and focuses all of her effort into her wrists and shoulders. She pulls in opposite directions and the block breaks clean off. The advancing men try to stop at this sight but the crowd surges them forward. Her arms come flying around her free, just as she opens her eyes.
The brunette intruder wearing their armor and carrying a double sided axe. The Faceless Demon, face muzzled, arms raised, as lightning begins spinning around her. In the darkness of the cave, in the flash of a moment, it almost looks like her eyes are made of lightning itself. They stand side by side and no one dares oppose their will.
For the first time in many moons, the great warriors go to war together.
Azula opens her palm and lightning blasts forth, surging through multiple bodies, killing the men instantly. The others fill in the gaps. Ty Lee moves forward and raises her weapon to block an incoming machete. She pushes back after parrying the blow and then kicks him in the chest. Her legs contain such force that she shatters his rib cage. He collapses into a heap. She watches him go and almost doesn't see another sword coming at her suddenly.
Azula tosses a few more bolts of lightning around the room before resorting to blue fire. The men had once feared her as a mythical beast. Now that they nearly had her dead they charge with renewed vigor. The sights and smells of death quickly fill the cave.
Ty Lee loses her labrys and goes tumbling away. She hasn't fought in a battle like this since she was 14, yet it comes back to her easily. She tumbles and jumps, away from wayward blades and hands, until she finds favorable positioning. She strikes chakras swiftly and then dodges more attacks. She delivers precise blows to arms and legs when she can, focusing first on survival and second on disarming her enemies.
Azula notices that fewer men are advancing. She focuses her energy into her feet. She rises up and spews fire down below. She's careful to not blast near where Ty Lee has slipped off towards. From her raised position she can see now that not all of the men are brave enough to face death head on. They now begin running for the exit. This brief moment of looking away costs her. Someone jumps up and grabs her foot. She is knocked off balance by the pull and then tumbles to the ground.
Ty Lee dances around her enemies, as they grow thin quickly. Surprised she realizes that no one is around her anymore as they all fall down. She looks back to Azula; The former Crown Princess briefly stares off into the distance. Hovering in the air, arms outstretched, she looked every bit the mythical figure these men believed her to be. The next moment though she falls from the sky as someone launches up and grabs her foot, pulling her down. Ty Lee doesn't hesitate. She sprints and begins flipping back to where they started.
Azula's head ricochets off a sharp rock. She is instantly dazed. The brave soul who had brought her down crawls to her quickly. Ty Lee lands nearby and sees it all unfolding. Azula groaning momentarily, the man trying to mount her. She finds her labrys on the ground again. She picks it up, spins around and then launches herself towards them both.
Azula looks up and sees him. The King of Faces is on top of her. He pushes her hands down, his whole body weight kneeling on top of her next. He puts both of his hands on her neck and begins strangling the life from her.
"No. More. Demons."
Azula opens her palms. He can't see it but she's about to electrocute him from point blank range. Suddenly Ty Lee appears behind him. She comes to a stop and rests the edge of the labrys into the back of his neck. He freezes. Azula freezes. Even Ty Lee freezes. They all think the same thing.
'Will she really do it?'
"Let her go!" She commands him.
He looks around. The last of his men run out the exit. The ones that are alive and can move anyway. He groans. 'Agni damn cowards.'
He tells her, "First she dies, and then you do."
"Ty Lee, listen to me." Azula gets her attention. She gambles with her own life. She's finding it harder to breathe. "You have to do it. Please, Ty Lee, please do it. He's going to kill us, Ty Lee."
Ty Lee's mouth is dry. Azula's face grows bluer as he suffocates her. All around her the men she has chiblocked are slowly regaining movement. She looks down. Azula's hands are pinned down. She can't use the lesson that Ty Lee taught her. The walls are closing in.
"Please."
"Shut up!"
"P-please!"
Azula's eyes roll into the back of her head. Ty Lee should drop the labrys and chiblock him. Something stops her. The King of Faces looks down upon the dying Faceless Demon. Dying by his hand at long last. Ty Lee rears back. The next moment, he loosens his grip involuntarily. He feels a giant shove into his shoulder. His head and upper body shakes. He looks down and sees a double sided axe buried into his neck.
"Ahhh!" Ty Lee screams in agony, fear, and resentment. She pulls with all of her power and retracts the blade. She rears it back again.
Breath returning to her, Azula opens her eyes. She watches something drop from his mouth like drool. She smiles as his blood splatters on her. His face and body are going into shock and Azula relishes it. She reaches up, grabs his robes, and holds him in place. Ty Lee sinks the axe into him again, this time driving it deeper into his shoulder and lower neck. She pulls him in.
Azula whispers in his ear, "Now you'll scream for me."
She looks up to the manic, terrified woman above her. "Ty Lee, you have to finish it."
"I-I can't."
"Ty Lee, if we don't kill him, he's going to come after us. They're all going to come after us."
She is sobbing as she holds the axe into his shoulder. He is in too much pain to interject on the topic. Azula pleads, "Please, Ty. We have to cut the head off the snake so it can't bite at our heels when we turn away."
Ty Lee lifts a hand up to wipe her tears. Her eyes roam all around. Fear and concern swirl around her. She reluctantly nods. With effort she retracts the axe from his shoulder. Blood gushes out, onto his clothes and it drips from the axe onto Azula.
She rolls him over onto his back and crawls up to stand behind Ty Lee. She leans closer to the brunette. He finally says something.
"No. Please."
"Do it, Ty Lee. Finish him!"
"No."
Ty Lee spins the labrys in her hand, unsure of what to do now that he pleads for his life.
"Please."
"He will hunt us where we hide. He'll come for Kyoshi Island. You heard them at town square and you heard them here. They will 'torch the island and salt the earth.' They'll bathe in Suki's blood and water their gardens with Lomin's."
She pauses for a beat to let this sink in. "But not if we end this now."
Ty Lee thinks about all the fellow warriors and friends she lost. How much they've sacrificed to bring Azula and her group to the island and how Azula has helped her to reach this point; to end Koh's Disciples.
' "No one should be okay with killing! All life is precious."
"All of life is about perspective, Ty Lee. Avatar Kyoshi was not above killing those who deserved it." '
She is a Kyoshi Warrior.
"Do it."
"Please-"
She raises the axe above her head. He does as Azula said he would.
He screams.
Two women race across the landscape of Gou Island. The black haired one leads the way, dragging the sullen brunette by the hand forward. Azula looks around in the morning sunlight. She's hot and bothered and all turned around. They had blindfolded her, so she isn't sure where she's going. One thing is certain though: wherever she is going, she is going with Ty Lee.
She lets go of the hand and wanders forward a bit to get a look around. She turns back and Ty Lee is clearly still shaken by what has just happened. She tries to break the ice.
"What do you want for dinner?" She asks sincerely.
Ty Lee comes out of her daze briefly at this question. She realizes that she doesn't know where she is and tries to process what's been asked. She keeps seeing the King of Faces. She keeps seeing the blood.
"Dinner?"
"Yes, maybe some tender beef and rice?" She asks with a smile. She turns back around, facing the sun and envelopes in the warmth and light. She thinks about the red meat. Ty Lee reaches up and wipes a fleck of something off her cheek. When she looks down she finds the smidge of blood on her hands.
Azula interjects over her thoughts. "I was thinking we could go to the Southern Water Tribe. Have you ever been? I haven't, but I've seen paintings and it's always looked so beautiful."
Ty Lee looks at her, her mind bouncing all over the place. She can't hold onto anything for more than a few seconds. She keeps seeing his face. She keeps hearing his scream.
"We could get a cabin, or maybe an igloo!" She says excitedly, the idea just now coming to her. A new idea comes to mind of something else she'd always secretly wanted. "Or maybe we could go to the middle of nowhere in the Earth Kingdom. No one would find us. We could be normal! And I have so much money that not even Zirin knows about, so we don't have to worry about any of that."
"Ok." Ty Lee replies, dumbfounded.
Azula stops and turns towards her. She recognizes that Ty Lee is not herself. She approaches her. Ty Lee had been staring out into the distant ocean, now she looks at Azula as she closes the distance between them. The former Crown Princess reaches down and clasps her hands. She speaks with a reassuring tone.
"You killed someone for the first time, so you're a little shocked. But you'll get better in no time," she says. She looks in her eyes. Gold mixes with grey. A kindness is conveyed in her voice, "I will take care of you."
Ty Lee blinks at her and doesn't move. Slowly her facial expression fades into a scowl. She retracts her hands. Azula notices but doesn't think anything of it. Her head is in the clouds. She's sky high off of adrenaline and overwhelming joy. They'd snuffed out Koh's Disciples and killed the King of Faces. Yet this was not just another page in Azula's legacy. Instead, this one was accomplished side by side with Ty Lee. No twisting of arms. No ill intent. Nothing.
Azula wanders close to a cliffside and looks down. Thirty feet below water splashes against the island. She sees no pirate ship anywhere within view. She surmises that the vessel that brought them here must be on the other side of the island. She must've taken a wrong turn somewhere. Staring out into the beautiful ocean view, she daydreams about what they've just done. What they'll do. She can still see his face. She can still hear his scream.
She turns to face the brunette with a lopsided smile. Absentmindedly she says, "I'm proud of you."
Ty Lee's eyes almost bulge out of her head. She wears a look of disgust as she asks, "You're proud of me?"
Azula stands up more straight, smile not fading. "We're safe because of you. Because you had the courage to act."
"What are you talking about?" Ty Lee asks, incredulous and genuinely confused.
"They're going to hunt us down now," Azula tells her. "Koh's Disciples aren't just something you can get rid of that easily. They're insects. They appeared because I existed. They're not going to go away with me alive. So they'll hunt us. But we will survive and endure."
Ty Lee tilts her head all the way to the side. She is starting to read between the lines and can't believe what she's hearing. "What do you think is happening right now?"
Azula tilts her head to the side now too. She approaches her childhood friend. She reaches for her hands and holds them again. "We have so much ahead of us. Our whole lives."
Ty Lee retracts her hands with force. This time Azula notices. Ty Lee squints as if it's difficult for her to see what she's hearing. She stutters as she speaks. "Y-you think I'm just going to join you now? Become some kind of girl friend in your criminal empire? Or some kind of what? What? Retirement? Like were fucking Kyoshi and Rangi?"
Azula is deeply hurt by this. She grits her teeth and strides past her, leaving the cliffside and heading back down the hill. "Stop it, Ty Lee. You're ruining the moment."
"I see now."
Azula stops and looks back at her, upset and brow furrowed. Ty Lee looks at her with new eyes. Enlightenment has found her. "You want me to be a mess. You want me to be scared."
Azula's head retracts in reproach. Ty Lee grows angrier and louder. She steps towards the Dragon Empress. She points at her own chest as she tells her, "But I'm like you now: I'm not afraid of anything. This is what you wanted!"
Azula steps towards her, nearly tearing up, a furious rage exploding from places she doesn't recognize. She yells in her face, "This is what you wanted!"
Azula is fighting back tears at all costs now. Ty Lee finally understands. She backs away from the Puppetmaster.
Azula clears her throat. She speaks with a voice that is obviously feigning confidence. She tells Ty Lee, "You love me."
"No." The response comes instantly and with true confidence.
"I love you."
"No." Ty Lee shakes her head.
"I do." Azula tells her with a broken voice and absolute confidence. Ty Lee steps further back.
"You don't understand what that is." She tells the Faceless Demon.
"I do! You're mine."
"No." Ty Lee looks with sad, grey eyes.
"You are," Azula tells her. She screams her fury out, "YOU'RE MINE!"
The acrobat turns away from the former Crown Princess. She steps to the cliffside and looks out at the ocean. She can't look at the black haired girl anymore.
Azula stares at the back of her head with pain and heartache; with fury and a raging fire. She blinks away tears. She had once wondered what it would be like to crack Ty Lee's head open and see what was inside. She lifts her hand out and speaks while a soft floom ignites. A fireball glows in her palm.
"Ty Lee," she pauses. The blue flame grows. "I thought you were special."
She does it before she can change her mind. The flame explodes and from only a few feet it quickly overwhelms the woman in armor. She goes up in flame and the blue fire is all that Azula sees. It consumes what it touches and scorches the earth. Azula doesn't know how long she holds the fire but eventually it fades and she realizes that no one is there anymore. The fire had left nothing standing. Not even the bones were left.
She lets the tears slide down her face. She turns away and goes home.
A/N: This chapter's OST is "Killer Shangri-La" by Pshycotic Beats.
Love always. Tyzula forever.
Notorious