Story largely inspired by the works Something to Hold Onto by Wildgoosery and Float and Crossing by sodomquake .
"The animals have been anxious lately," Jet observed, watching as quail went flying from the bushes. He leaned backwards in his chair, the legs in front bobbing gently on and off the floorboards of the watchtower.
"I think you're just anxious lately," Zuko argued halfheartedly, but there was some truth in it. Jet had been more on edge than usual.
Jet smiled, swishing his pipe from one corner of his lips to the other. "Maybe," he admitted. "But even the birds sound different. I'm telling you."
"The birds, " Zuko repeated, a dumbfounded look washing over his face. " Sound different."
Jet chuckled softly as he rolled his head to look lovingly at the boy sitting beside him. "I guess you wouldn't be able to tell," he said, not unkindly. "I've been listening to them for longer than you have."
And Zuko supposed that much was true. There was no arguing that Jet had this innate sense of nature that would more than likely stay a foreign concept to Zuko. Palace life had never burdened itself with such ideals, and living out on the road hadn't even touched the surface of what this kind of survival looked like. Thankfully, because of Jet, he'd gathered some sense, but for many things (most, if he were honest) he was virtually useless for a long time.
"What do you think it means?" Zuko asked, half indulging and half curious.
"Dunno','' Jet answered, averting his gaze back to the green fields before them. A stone wall ran parallel to the line of trees, marking the official edge of the Freedom Fighter's territory, but most Fire Nation troops knew not to step foot into the forest at all. Jet flicked his pipe towards the sky. "Guess we'll find out."
Smellerbee knocked on the stilt of the tower from below.
"You're late," Jet noted, but a smile curled his lips as he looked over the side.
"Oh, shut up," she scolded. "Like you and Li aren't late all the time. Too busy getting each other off."
Zuko blushed, heavily, as he averted his eyes to a splinter of wood that was suddenly pretty interesting. He was still not used to just how… open they were, but he supposed it made sense. There wasn't room for much dignity in their neck of the woods, and though he'd somewhat gotten used to bathing in front of others and letting Jet dress him in mismatched leather armor and things of the like, the candor of conversation was still unfamiliar territory.
"We're gonna' check the hunting traps in the west wing today," Jet said, unfazed, as he and Zuko trekked down the wooden ladder. Their feet touched the worn-down spot on the ground below, the tall grass swaying slightly in the wind ahead of them.
"West wing, huh?" Smellerbee mused. "We don't ever catch anything over there. It's cursed. I swear."
"Nah," Jet argued. "Just unlucky. Right, Li?"
Zuko shrugged at the name that wasn't his, not nearly as bothered as he should be by it. To them, he was Li, a mysterious boy from the east end of the desert. Just another victim of war, left to wander the world in hopes of finding belonging, and in some ways, he had done that, just not in the ways he'd expected.
To them, he wasn't the son of the tyrant lord that was decimating their country. He wasn't a traitor, or a disgrace to his family name. He was Li, and people liked Li. And that made the lies so easy to excuse, and so very easy to forget about.
"See? He agrees," Jet said, as if Zuko had said something definitive. "Besides, I gotta' weird feeling today. Who knows? Might be somethin' over there."
As it turned out, Smellerbee was right, much like she always was. The sun was setting by the time they were done checking the traps, all equally as empty as the last. Their fingers laced as they walked back towards camp, Jet's eyes focused on shadows in the distance, Zuko's on the loose leather tie of Jet's armor. He reached his free hand to pull it, just a tad, and the plate went slack on Jet's shoulder.
"That's doing you a lot of good," Zuko noted, feeling like a mother chastising a child with untied shoestrings.
Jet looked down to the plate, then up to his eyes, and smiled wide. "Says the boy who gets his armor put on by someone else."
"That's not relevant," Zuko argued, and Jet smiled wider. "And if you want me to put your armor on, you can just say so."
"Maybe," Jet purred, then reached to place Zuko's hand back on his shoulder plate. "I want you to take it off ."
"Here?" Zuko asked before he had much time to think. He looked around the dimming forest. Surely, the darkness would be upon them soon. "I don't know if-"
"It'll be fine," Jet assured. "Fire Nation troops don't come out this far. Too afraid of the spirits."
"I don't think they're as superstitious as you think," Zuko argued, but Jet's hands were already weaving themselves around his belt loops, guiding his body backwards until he was pressed against a tree trunk. He hissed as Jet's lips plunged towards his throat, nipping there in the way he knew Zuko liked, tiny bites that left crescents that'd only last an hour or two.
Jet seemed to consider this for a moment as he worked, then paused to smile against the curve of his neck. "Even so," he said, half amused and half genuine. "I'll protect you."
"With your cock?" Zuko teased dryly. He tried to follow it with a laugh, only for it to be caught in his throat as Jet nipped particularly hard on his shoulder.
Sensing Zuko going rigid, Jet smiled and raised his head to observe his half-lidded expression. Zuko met the look, Jet's honey brown eyes and warm smile melting him in ways he'd never thought possible. "Well, it is my third sword," Jet said.
Zuko chuckled despite himself, laughter always coming more freely with Jet than with anyone else. It seemed to make Jet's smile even brighter too, which is something he couldn't help but to want to see more of. It was just too beautiful a thing for it to be a seldom occurrence. "Let's just be happy it isn't curved like the other two."
"Yeah?" Jet mused, pushing his pelvis into Zuko's. "I think you'd like it even if it was." Jet snaked his hands backwards, gripping Zuko's ass.
Zuko gave him a teasing smirk and raised his eyebrow. "You should show me how much you like mine ."
"Oh?" Jet said. He dropped in one limber swing into a crouching position, using the momentum of the movement to yank his pants off his hips. Zuko's cock sprung out, and his head fell back against the tree as Jet gripped it with long, thin fingers. "I like it when you're bossy, Li ."
And normally, the name didn't bother him so much, but times like this, when it was just him and Jet, the name twisted his stomach into knots. It was when it was said and it was supposed to mean something, to erect an emotion out of him, when it left Jet's lips in panting breaths that were only supposed to be shared with someone he knew , someone he trusted, that the name suddenly felt foreign, and far away.
But Jet's lips wrapped around his cock all but drowned out the fleeting wave of guilt, and he found himself knotting his fingers into the back of Jet's hair regardless. Jet hummed at the contact, the vibration at the back of his throat nearly enough to make him come right then and there. He looked down to meet Jet's eyes, and the lips that were wrapped around him lifted at the edges in a distorted grin. Sometimes he was jealous of his alter ego, because Jet surely wouldn't be as happy to please the real him.
With a wet pop, Jet removed his lips. "You can be loud. We aren't in camp."
Zuko could all but nod, and Jet was at it again. He'd gotten so used to the close quarters that subduing his moans had become second nature. It felt obnoxious when the first unmuffled one left his lips, no longer drowned out by biting his palm or Jet's fingers corking his mouth. It was fun though, the occasions where their escapades weren't limited to the straw bed covered in stolen Fire Nation blankets, where there was no one to hear them but the trees. Freeing, in a way.
" Fuck, Jet," he breathed, his legs feeling like they would crumble like sand underneath him at any moment. His head was heavy on his shoulders, fingers digging into brown locks so hard that Jet let out a yelp of pain around his cock. He didn't let up though - Jet would be mad if he did - only pushed his head harder towards the base. He puppeteered Jet's head for a few minutes longer, the tension in his body building like water in a pipe with no valve. Holding his breath, he let the pressure build until there was nothing to do but burst.
He smiled for a split second before his brow creased, no longer able to contain composure. "Fuck, Jet, I'm gonna' come." Not like he had to announce it - his grip had probably said everything for him. He let out a long, embarrassingly loud moan as he came, but Jet didn't seem to mind it, only hummed through it, eyes locked on his near pained expression. Jet gave a few more slow strokes with his hand, Zuko's grip having gone slack on the back of his head, and licked the tip before swallowing the evidence.
Zuko looked down, drowsy but satisfied, and Jet could all but smile as he raised himself to meet his eyes.
"My turn," he purred, taking no pause to cup Zuko's hand over his own bulge.
"No recovery time for me, huh," Zuko teased, half lidded eyes falling open.
Jet smiled and shook his head, gripping Zuko's hand over him hard . "I've waited long enough. Fuck, baby, you got me so hard, it probably won't even take long." The sound of a belt unclicking, and a moment later Jet's cock was in his hand. Jet gasped at the contact, a little more open with his expressions of pleasure, and it was almost enough to get him rock hard again.
But of course, it wasn't until he was on his knees, Jet's cock buried in the back of his throat, his back pressed up against the tree, that the stirring between his legs had given full rise again. Even though Jet towered over him, caught between a rock and a hard place, he never felt more in control. He loved getting Jet like this, watching his body slump and go slack, every ounce of attention he had spent watching Zuko work at him. It was like he could single handedly make all his anxieties go away, if only for the moment. And Jet was right, it didn't take long at all.
Zuko's tongue went salty, and Jet leaned to balance himself against the tree. He gathered himself in a few long, deep breaths before opening his eyes. Zuko slid himself up between him and the trunk, and Jet smiled a little before craning for a sloppy, uncaring kiss.
"Let's go home," Zuko murmured before his cock had a chance to keep them out until midnight.
Jet smiled, satisfied, and placed a quick peck to his cheek. "Let's go home," he agreed.
Even though home was nothing more than a series of brown tents pitched between tree stubs and a half dozen rough log cabins, nothing had felt more like home in years. Jet smiled as he spotted Smellerbee sitting by a fire, poking away at a few quail turning over the coals, the fat dripping down and sizzling; a familiar, welcoming smell. The rest of camp was off doing who knows what, the rag tag group of refugees scurrying about with marginal organization.
Jet scraped a chair through the dirt, flipping it around for Li to sit before grabbing one for himself. Li smiled that little shy smile of his, the one that Jet found to be the most endearing, before taking a seat. Jet smiled back, disregarding Smellerbee who was staring at them with an eyebrow cocked.
"You guys are so gross," she noted, flipping a golden-brown quail onto a plate with a wet sounding plop.
"You're just mad Longshot doesn't look at you like that," Jet teased.
"He does too!" she argued, ripping off a quail leg and slapping it onto another plate. She paused and raised her gaze to eye him from under her bangs. "...Right?"
Li nudged his arm, giving him the look of disapproval. "See what you've done? Don't listen to Jet."
Smellerbee smirked and stuck her tongue out, to which Jet blew a puff of smoke out of his pipe in her direction. This was their routine almost daily. He would say something mildly offensive to her, to which she, in all her kindly manners and gentle ways, would fret over it. But he always assured that he was, in fact, only joking, and she'd smile and bat him away. She was quite possibly the only person he enjoyed teasing more than Li.
Speaking of teasing Li.
"I hate to inform you," Jet said, handing off a plate to him. "We are still fresh out of silver cutlery. You will have to settle for peasant sticks like the rest of us."
"Oh, haha," Li retorted, twirling the wooden chopsticks in his fingertips. "Make fun of my manners all you want. At least I don't eat like someone is going to snatch my food away like you do."
"You never know," Jet said, smirking. "Someone might actually snatch it from you."
As much as he teased Li for his prim and properness, it was actually quite adorable. Li had never as much as put an elbow on a table in the whole time he'd known him, meanwhile he himself would slurp the marrow out of a quail bone before picking his teeth with it (on a regular basis). He'd assumed long ago that Li had come from some sort of money, but once a refugee, it doesn't matter much where one comes from. Merchant or farmer, lord or peasant, the Fire Nation would take it all.
Not here though. Here they could live happily and hidden with the rest of the refugees, finally free from the terrors of the colonizers.
They'd already taken everything from him. His village, his money, his family . He wouldn't let them get Smellerbee, or Longshot, or Li too. Couldn't . Refused to. He'd kill every last one of them if he had to.
"I'd like to see someone try," Li said, joking of course, but Jet couldn't help but to agree. Let them try.
Zuko sat at the edge of the bed, which was nothing more than straw covered in stolen Fire Nation blankets, the red thread long having faded into muted browns, but they smelled of home. They smelled of Jet and the soft tones of pepper and smoke.
In fact, most things they had came from the troops stupid enough to trek through the forest. The copper pots clanking together in the wind outside, the kerosene lamp that was posted to the trunk that held the tent up, the tent, everything.
The Fire Nation might be bastards, but their technology is mighty fine. Jet had said, drunk on sake.
Zuko had laughed, because it was rather funny (Jet shitfaced on sake, that is), but what wasn't funny, was that he had to pretend he didn't know how to use most of it already. He fumbled with the lamp at first, playing dumb that he didn't know how they worked, like he didn't have three that used to hang in his bedroom back home.
Home. This tent with a scratchy straw bed was more home than that place would ever be, and it only took one person to make it so.
Jet laid lazily across the bed, the lamp light warm against his skin. His arms were behind his head, legs splayed out, shirtless and unburdened by self-consciousness. His eyes were dark in the low light, scanning the threads of the tent above him. He flicked his pipe mindlessly up and down in his lips. Zuko had questioned him once and only once about the odorous habit; specifically about two aspects of it. One was why he always rubbed the dottle in a circle after knocking it out, and the other was why he always played with the stem in his teeth. For both he'd answered that his father did it, and the pipe was the last thing he had of him. Zuko hadn't questioned it again, and he did have to admit that Jet looked rather fitting with it.
When Jet was relaxed like this, languorous and placid, memories unfocused on his past, he quite resembled a Prince himself. The Spirit of the Forest, Shishigami, Zuko had jokingly called him once. Jet had smiled but shrugged the title away. Too formal, he'd called it, but he admitted it did have a nice ring.
Jet smiled under his pipe, rolling his head to peer at him. "Who you lookin' at?"
"You," Zuko answered, smiling as he did.
Longshot sat up high on a tree stub, looking, eyes cutting through the forest into the darkness. He uncurled his long legs, looked to Jet as they approached, his serious expression unfaltering under his hood.
We need to talk he said, emotionless and wordless, his eyes looking like bugs partnered with the black bags underneath them. If there was a person who might be more anxious than Jet, it'd be Longshot. The difference: he never jumped the gun, only noticeable if you watched how his fingers twitched to his bow at every noise.
Jet and Zuko nodded in understanding and slipped under the patched-together tent. Longshot followed, standing with one shoulder to the opening, the other to his leader.
Fire Nation. East End. Longshot gestured, tapping an arrow back into the quiver. Zuko counted the arrows fastened there, all present. Disengaged.
"Tag any?" Jet asked, hushed, then looked over his shoulder to a mockingbird chirping from outside the tent. He furrowed his brow, cocked an ear toward it, and disregarded it just as fast. Maybe you're just anxious lately.
Longshot shook his head, hood falling off his face. Too many.
"How many?"
Three sets of five fingers held up. Bout fifteen .
"Benders?"
Longshot shrugged, waving a hand back and forth in a way that seemed unworried. One, I think. Two, at most .
"Good," Jet said, then looked to Zuko. He smiled genuinely, but not in the way that Zuko liked. It was the one with too many teeth in it. More like some feral growl than a smile. "Wanna come with me?"
"Are they in the forest yet?" Zuko asked. Longshot shook his head. "We should leave them alone then."
"What?" Jet snapped, standing to throw his hands out to his side. "We can't let those bastards anywhere near the forest."
Zuko gestured Longshot out, flicking a hand towards the flap. "We need to speak." Longshot looked to Jet, who nodded in reluctant approval, before throwing his hood over his head and leaving the tent.
"What is wrong with you?" Jet asked, accusing, as soon as the flap had fallen shut.
"Wrong with me?" Zuko countered. " You're the one who agreed we wouldn't engage if they hadn't entered the forest yet."
"Yeah, that was before they started bringing those demons with them. Two benders, Li, two. "
So what? He wanted to ask, but he knew better not to. The only good firebender was a dead one to Jet, and the thought always made him wince, but Jet never noticed.
"Jet," he said instead, calm and steady, pleading almost. "That's more reason to let them pass by. I don't want you to get hu-"
"I'd die," Jet interrupted, snapping his words off. "Before I let them near anyone in this camp. This is the one place that hasn't been touched by them. I'd die to keep it that way."
"You don't have to," Zuko snapped back, his voice rising, splitting at the end. "What about me? Huh? Want me to come along and die with you?"
Jet's mouth opened to counter, but closed before a word could come out. He furrowed his brows, stunned into silence, and rubbed his palm across his face. Zuko watched him as he did, too angry to stop himself.
"I don't want you to die," he said, softer this time, voice cracking. "And I know you're angry. I know it, okay? This place may be the one place, but you , you're the one person that binds me to this earth."
Jet's expression shifted, looking downwards to his boots, face softened under the light of kerosene. Times like this he looked more like a boy, lines on his face not creased and aged with anger. He sighed, rolled a rock under his boot, and looked to Zuko, a pitiful smile twitching his lips.
"Well," he said, and Zuko studied his face, eyebrows creased with worry. "I couldn't have you unbound to the earth. Could I?"
He said it jokingly, but Zuko couldn't find it in him to smile. Though, he did feel relieved, at least a little. He hated that smart ass tone, but that was the Jet he knew. The Jet he liked. The Jet that bound him to the earth.
"No, you couldn't," he said, deadpan.
"They take one step in the forest, and I'm going," Jet said, his smile having faded back into nothing.
"Okay," Zuko agreed. "As long as I go with you."
"I'll always want you with me," Jet said, looking to his boots again. "Always."
The west wing was quiet as usual, and Zuko was beginning to wonder if there were any animals in this part of the forest at all. Cursed as Smellerbee said. Seemed unlikely, too superstitious, but more true as time went on.
Jet cocked an ear in the air, Zuko barely noticed as he sighed. "Let's just go ho-."
"Shh," Jet shushed him, finger up in the air.
Zuko listened too, didn't hear anything close. Didn't hear much at all. He waited, ignoring the slight crunch of his boots on top of the leaves. Then he heard it. A strange, far-away and unearthly sound, like the squeal of a cow-pig, but bigger. More desperate, pained. Maybe it got a leg caught in a trap?
Zuko turned to Jet, half-expecting a grin about the pork dinner they'd soon be enjoying. But he wasn't smiling, not at all. His eyes were scanning the distance. "Let's go," Jet said, more hushed. He picked up to a half-run, ears following the sound, and Zuko followed, no questions asked.
It wasn't hard to find, the sound of the beast rattling the forest in a way that was unsettling. Jet was ahead of him as they sprinted, crossing over the rocky threshold that kept the animal from their view. As he stepped atop the highest rock, he froze, stock-still.
Zuko wasn't far behind, pushing his way into view. The sounds of the boar whomped into his eardrums like thunder as he stood there, stunned into stillness. The giant boar was smoking. Fur singed and stinking and patched like a fire had been set underneath it, hooves scraping and tearing at the ground like staying still was the worse thing it could do. It squealed and threw itself around, rubbing against tree trunks in attempt to dislodge the arrows buried into its thick skull. Red feathered arrows, like the Yuyan. After a few moments that felt agonizingly long to watch, it fell to its knees exhausted, and eventually went still, eyes open.
Zuko looked sideways at Jet, who's gaze never left the creature, eyebrows pursed and eyes wide.
Zuko was first to speak, words shaky with nerves. "We have to-," he started, then paused, not even sure where he was going with it.
"Fuck this." It left Jet's mouth like poison, dripping with vengeance and long pent-up anger. He threw a hand out. "Do you see this?"
And then he was turning on his heels, long legs striding with purpose in the direction that wasn't home.
"Jet, stop," Zuko pleaded as he pulled Jet's shoulder, which was wrenched from his grasp. He looked at his hand, wounded by it.
" Fuck that, Li," Jet argued, still walking away. "They're here. I knew those bastards couldn't miss a chance."
Miss the chance for what, Zuko wasn't sure, but he didn't question it. Only kept up with Jet as well as he could. "We should think this through. Make a plan so we don't die," he rationalized. Funny coming from him, the man that didn't think much through at all.
Jet stopped abruptly, so abruptly that Zuko bumped into him. "Like what? No, this ends now." He threw a pointed finger at the ground, like a fed-up parent reprimanding a child. " You said it. If they came in the forest, they're done for. Are you with me or not?"
Zuko sighed, looked at the ground. "You know I am," he said lowly, as if it shouldn't be questioned. Just… he had hoped it wouldn't be like this. But it was always like this.
That seemed to slow Jet down enough though, and he palmed a hand over his face and breathed. "We have to," he said, a little calmer now. "We have to at least survey, engage if we can. We'll do it quiet. Quick. Alright? No need to involve the others if we don't have to. Me and you. We'll take care of it."
Well, it wasn't much of a plan, but a plan nonetheless. Zuko nodded.
"Be careful," Jet said after a moment, gave him a stern look. Like he'd kill him a second time if he wasn't.
"You too."
Jet gave him a lopsided grin. "I'm always careful."
The Fire Nation camp wasn't far off, wasn't hard to find either. Campfire smoke floated into the sky, leaving an undisputable trail right to them. Zuko cringed at the cockiness, an arrogance that he himself had once possessed. There's power in numbers, but more in silence, a lesson the world had humbled him with several times over.
As soon as the red of the tents were in view, up the trees they went, silent as apparitions. Jet stuck a knife into a tree trunk, put his ear against it.
"How many?" Zuko whispered.
Jet listened for another moment, then shrugged by way of answer. "Bout fifteen, I guess. Like Longshot said. Not sure. Not as good at this as that Sokka guy."
Zuko's eyebrow raised. Was it…? No, couldn't be. Not important.
"You stay here, and I'll circle around and get on the other side," Jet said, and before Zuko could answer, he was already standing. Zuko snatched his wrist.
Jet raised a questioning brow down at him.
"I just-," Zuko said, heat rushing to his cheeks. Really, really not the time for bashfulness.
Thankfully, Jet got the hint. He kneeled to Zuko's level, placed his lips to Zuko's, kissed him in a way that felt too much like goodbye to be of any real comfort. Then he was on his feet, smiling too much to be considered a sane man about to enter a battle.
"Wait for my signal." Then he was gone, gracefully crossing the line of tree limbs until out of sight.
Zuko waited, silently watching as the soldiers meandered about camp, happy and drunk and probably the reason they decided to obliterate an animal for fun. There was a woman with them who looked like she definitely didn't want to be, being passed around like a toy from lap to lap, uncomfortable and fearful as men sloshed whatever alcohol they were drinking onto her dress.
An obstacle in the war path, he wished Longshot were here. Hoped Jet would take notice of her as quickly as he did. He heard a whistle, looked up and around. There Jet was across the threshold, pointing at her. Good, he'd noticed. She was probably Earth Kingdom, too hard to tell at a distance though.
What wasn't hard to tell was that the majority were Yuyan archers, only a couple bearing bender uniforms. What they were doing out here, he wasn't sure. Probably a ploy by Zhao to take over the mantle of finding the avatar. Bastard.
Zuko slipped the theatre mask over his face, a new knot forming in his stomach. The Yuyan were generally royal soldiers, meaning they'd be a little too familiar with him. He wanted to get this done, and get it done quick. If they stayed close enough, the archers couldn't get a good shot without shooting each other. Which was good for two dual wielders. He slipped the blades from the sheath, waited just another moment for the ready call. He slinked out the branches, headed for the camp in a casual pace, and in their drunken stupor, they hadn't noticed him until he was dead center by the campfire.
A couple of them gasped upon seeing them, one fell off the log he was planted on. "What the hell boy?" scolded a soldier from behind him.
Zuko looked at the girl, met her eyes from behind the mask. "Let the girl go."
"You tryna' die son?" a soldier barked with a laugh. "Ain't you ever heard of finders' keepers?"
Zuko couldn't help the disgusted twitch of his lip. He scanned the soldiers, picked out the two benders of the group, their fists already starting to curl.
"Last chance," he warned. A few of the men laughed, which was just adding fuel at this point. One bender stood up, sloppy and lumbering, and went to stick a finger at him. The second it pressed the skin of his shoulder down, Zuko took the blade of his sword and sliced into the man's ribs, and the breath left his chest.
Not a second later, Jet was landing behind the group, already jamming the pointed end of his hook into a distracted man's jugular. The group whipped around, too stunned to move just yet, and Jet was already using that distraction to hook another around the neck, slicing it wide open.
The man in front of Zuko was still reeling, and he knew he had to act fast. Take care of the benders before they could get to Jet. The man gasped out. "You bastar-," he started, but it was too late, the dao blade had already stolen his air, and he fell.
Thankfully, the other bender charged him, roaring some inarticulate animal rage as the flames balled in his fist. Zuko knocked it away with relative ease, cutting the man's arm and spilling the blood onto the dirt. If the blow had landed, Zuko wasn't sure he'd have a head anymore. So, he returned the sentiment, sent the blade deep into his stomach.
The archers were scrambling, throwing together their bows and arrows. Zuko caught a glimpse of Jet, twirling and cutting like some murderous dancer, and he'd already cut down two more soldiers. The girl was screaming when Zuko caught sight of her again, plunging an arrow with her hands into an archer's artery. No time for math now, but it seemed pretty good odds at this point.
"Bitch," an archer hissed as he snatched the woman up by her dress and threw her to the ground. He docked an arrow as she scrambled across the dirt, lifted it, and pointed-
Zuko's blade cracked the wood of the bow in a not-so-clean cut, but it was enough to make it worthless. The archer's eyes went wide, and he stumbled backwards, pulling a dagger from his waistband. He charged, yelling and sloppy, and he went down about as easy as the rest of them did. The girl snatched the dagger up before Zuko had time to process that she'd even gotten to her feet. Smart girl.
Zuko pivoted, and an archer had finally gotten the right idea. His bow was lifted over his shoulder like a baseball bat, and he swung it with the gusto of one, right into Zuko's mask.
He felt the crack of his nose first, felt the blood drip second, all as he was on the way to the forest floor. The mask tumbled off his face and flew behind him, his swords only weakly still in his hands. The man was on top of him before he could blink, or register the new sunlight in his eyes, and he raised his fist like he was about to beat him to death with his bare hands.
But he paused, eyes wide and full of newfound surprise. Fuck.
"Prince… Prince Zuko?" he gasped, his hand still wavering and shaking. Zuko took the opportunity to knee him in the groin, and he fell to his hands, straddling him. Then someone was yanking the man off of him, and a sharpened hook plunged into the man's neck.
Then nothing. Radio silence. Zuko sat up as fast as he could, still confused and starstruck. Jet stood there, chest heaving and panting like a punctured bellow, blood spattered all over him and dirt smudged on his face. His eyes were wide and demented, and after a moment they cut to Zuko, who's heart fell to his stomach.
He'd never seen Jet look like that , especially not at him. Maybe something inside him finally cracked, maybe he heard. Zuko's eyes stayed wide as Jet right-faced and marched towards him, all walk and no talk. Zuko ignored the immediate and innate urge to scramble backwards, hoping. Praying.
Maybe he didn't hear it. Maybe he's just catching his breath, maybe-
But it seemed every ounce of hostility left Jet at once, and his knees buckled the closer he got, the hooks slipping from his hands and falling to the dirt. Zuko's face was in his gentle hands in an instant, his eyes searching and worrying.
"Dumbass," Jet scolded from behind his teeth. "Let yourself get hit. Like a dumbass."
He was yelling at him. Scolding him. But it didn't matter. As long as it wasn't for that reason, Zuko could handle it. Tears prickled in his eyes, and suddenly the pain from his nose was the only thing he could feel in his body, the adrenaline and fear seeping away into Jet's brown eyes.
He threw his arms around Jet, who seemed oddly surprised by it, but he let it happen, eyes still scanning the soldiers in case any decided they could get back up.
"Come on, no time for this," Jet ordered as he lifted Zuko to his legs. "And you," he said, and Zuko knew he was speaking to the woman from the way his voice raised. Jet had a certain voice when speaking to women, and they seemed to like it. Seemed calmed by it. A skill Zuko hadn't yet learned. "Go home. Quickly."
She sniffled and saddled up to them, her whole body shaking with adrenaline and worry. She searched in her pocket frantically, dug something out and cupped it into Zuko's hand.
"Take this," she said, voice nothing but scratches. "Take this and if you ever need help, just play this. I don't know how, but my dad said it would help. I want you guys to have it."
Zuko looked down at the object in his hand, a circular pai sho tile with a lotus flower. He furrowed his brow at it, not quite understanding.
"And if you ever need my help, I owe you my life," she added. "My name's Jin."
"Where will you go?" Jet asked.
"Ba Sing Se, I think," she said. "Don't have much home to go back to."
A familiar story. "You could come with us?" Jet asked, which wasn't much of a surprise. He was good for taking in strays.
She shook her head. "You've done enough. Besides, I think I might join the resistance group."
Zuko and Jet both raised a questioning brow.
"With the avatar," she explained, like it was common knowledge. "He should be there by now."
Zuko's heart skipped, and his eyes went wide before he'd had the chance to stop them.
Jet nodded. "Good luck."
"Thank you," she said, bowed, and scampered off.
"Let's get home," Jet said, and he sounded tired, distant. Zuko nodded, and the two helped each other limp back home.
But a thought pestered him, behind the pain of his nose and the rush of his heart, the thought ate at him the whole walk back.
The avatar is in Ba Sing Se
Thanks for reading!
Love reading comments and no, they don't have to be detailed! But would love to read the detailed ones too!