Earlier that morning…

Zuko made it to his training place, but he hesitated to start training. Who was watching me, and why? He looked around before sliding down into the ridge. Was I followed? "Come out," he whispered. The bottom of the ridge turned to water. The water dragon formed inside it and swam to the surface. Silently, it hauled itself out. It shook its head. No people.

Zuko relaxed. His refuge was still safe. "Why am I being watched? I haven't done anything wrong."

The water dragon began to flap its fins and wave its tail with increasing levels of excitement. Zuko waited for it to get all the joy out of its system. When it was done, it trotted up to him and tapped him on the shoulder. They talk about you. Go and listen!

"What?! If they're talking about me, the last thing I should do is throw myself into their company. I have to stay away until the talk dies down."

The water spirit shook its head. Go and listen. You'll be safe. Promise.

Zuko wavered. He did not doubt the water spirit. If it said he would be safe, he would be. But its definition of "safe" was not the same as his. It thought he was safe traveling with the Avatar, which meant its definition of "safe" was so distorted as to be unrecognizable. Maybe he would be better off doing the exact opposite of whatever it thought was "safe." But they were in the Water Tribes now, among the water spirit's own people. Surely it knew its own people?

"If I hear one burst of laughter, I'll turn right around and come back here. And I won't trust your promises anymore, either," he told it. The water dragon flapped its fins twice. It was okay with that, which meant either that its definition of "safe" aligned with his (unlikely) or that it thought it could force him to trust it regardless of his wishes (very likely). Zuko's fists clenched. I hate spirits.

His heart pounded as he climbed down the tunnel. He got a feeling like he was walking to his own execution. All of his instincts screamed at him to stay away. But the water spirit had promised. He emerged from the tunnel and looked around. I don't feel like I'm being watched now…

He walked into the city. As soon as he came to the first canal, the sensation of being watched returned. He sat down at the edge of the canal and tried to look unbothered. What do I do? I've never tried to find out what other people are saying about me before. I'm not a sneak like Azula. How do I find out about stuff?

A giggle some distance away caught his attention. Some kids chased each other over a bridge some ways down the canal. That's it! The kids! They'll tell me what people are saying about me. Zuko got up and went to the bridge. By the time he got to it, the kids had moved on, but they were still within sight. They threw snowballs at each other.

Zuko walked up and waved. "Hi!"

The kids dropped all their snowballs and gasped. Several of them hid behind the oldest boy, peeking out at Zuko shyly. "Hi!" the boy yelped back. "Um…sir?" He ended up standing ramrod straight, like a soldier before a commanding officer.

"What are you doing?"

"Just being respectful."

Zuko blinked. "Why?"

"It's really nice to meet you," one of the shyer children said.

They're acting just like the old man. He said it was an honor to meet me. Who did he think I was? Who do they think I am? Zuko raised his hands. "You don't have to act so formal. I just thought your game looked like fun."

"We were just throwing snowballs," the oldest boy said.

"Yeah. Snowballs are cool."

The children relaxed. One of the shy ones stepped out and made himself look bold, like he had never hidden behind someone else for a second. "I've got the best aim in the whole tribe."

Another one came out. It was a girl. "I make the best snowballs."

"I'm the strongest," the oldest boy said.

"Uh oh," Zuko said, widening his eyes and taking a step back. "I'm in trouble."

The boys laughed, but the girl shook her head. "No you're not! You're an ice spirit. Snow can't hurt you."

What?! Zuko stared back at her. "Who told you that?"

She pointed at the oldest boy, who said, "My dad told me. He said it was the talk of the whole tribe, that a spirit had come to visit in the form of a guy with a scar."

Zuko's first thought was that he should correct their misconceptions. His first impulse was exactly the opposite. Before he could stop himself, he told them, "Your dad had a few details wrong. I'm not an ice spirit. I'm some other kind." What. Am. I. Doing.

"Oh? What kind of spirit are you?"

…You know what, telling people weird stuff about me worked out yesterday. These are little kids. They would never reject me. Let's see how far I can go. "I'm actually an honorary spirit," Zuko said. "I was born human, but adopted by spirits and raised in their ways."

The kids looked confused. "Huh? Are you a spirit or a human?"

Zuko smiled and didn't answer. "What else have you heard about me?"

"You talk to spirits," the little girl said.

Zuko nodded. "Completely true. All the time."

"You have spirit powers."

"Also true."

The little girl walked right up to him. She stared up, her eyes shining. "All the stories about you are true?"

Zuko didn't know what the stories about him said, but he nodded anyway.

"What are you?" asked the oldest boy.

Zuko grinned. "I love it when people can't answer that question." As he watched the children staring back at him, wonder and confusion filling their faces, a strange burning sensation flared to life inside him. He would not, could not, correct them. Why couldn't the stories about him be true? Why did anything outlandish about him have to be denied? Why couldn't every word he said be believable? Who gave anyone the right to decide what was or wasn't true about him, anyway? The people of this tribe don't know who or what I am. I could be anything. I could be anyone. I don't have to be me. Zuko's entire body filled with warmth. Liquid sunlight poured through his veins. A euphoria he'd felt only once before, when the air walker children believed him to be a dragon, made him want to burst out laughing.

Instead, he waved goodbye. "Thanks for the talk. Enjoy your game." He turned and walked away. I can do whatever I want. I can say ANYTHING. Haha. Ahahahaha!

.

Kalika told Mushi exactly what she'd done to earn Lee's trust. She did not tell him what Lee's answers to any of her stupid-sounding questions were, but she told him that Lee enjoyed answering the questions and came to trust her. "That's how you can get through to him. The key is that you have to be completely sincere. If you ask these questions just to make him happy, if you're going through the motions but you won't actually believe what he says, he'll know. You have to sincerely want to get to know him from the ground up, as if you had never met him before."

"But I've known him his whole life," Mushi said.

Kalika shook her head. "Not true. Remember what you told me, that he was starting to look and act like a stranger? Get to know that stranger. Make friends with him. I don't think forcing Lee to go back to being who he was will work. I doubt that the person you thought he was ever really existed."

"You want me to let my nephew go down this dark path?"

Kalika shook her head. "I don't think that's what's happening. Lee is away, truly away, from his father's influence for the first time in his life. This is his chance to figure out who he is. Let him experiment with his identity. It's normal and healthy."

"I don't think you understand. He's done some very bad things that he will have to live with for the rest of his life."

"I know," Kalika said with a nod. "He's trying out his father's identity. There's nothing wrong with that, except that he should have been allowed to do it earlier in a safer environment."

"There have to be better ways to figure out who he is than alienating everyone who cares about him."

"You have a choice, Mushi. You can be part of and witness to this exciting transformational stage in your nephew's life, or you can be locked out of it. What's it gonna be?"

She left him to ponder the question on his own. Outside, she took a deep breath. Was that a bit much? Had she overreached? Was she leaping to conclusions too fast? Kalika pushed those doubts away. She had decided to take a more active role and to trust herself. She had to stand by those decisions. She wasn't a trainee anymore.

She went to the hospital and told the head nurse to expect a visit that night.

.

Iroh was ashamed. He had trusted the advice of a stranger over his own instincts. That man in the diner thought sixteen was too old to be acting out. But he lived at the North Pole, surrounded by a frozen wilderness filled with opportunities for hunting and fishing and other tests of bravery against young men of a similar age. Zuko had never had any of that. Iroh never should have listened to that man; he didn't know what he was talking about.

If Kalika was right, Iroh wasn't doing much better.

Iroh took his Pai Sho set to the diner and played. It focused his mind, helping him think. Zuko used very different strategies, didn't he? Destroying the Avatar's pieces in all out war one game, blocking the boundaries of the board next game. Wasn't it Iroh himself who had said the way a person played was a reflection of themselves? Zuko was trying out different strategies. So of course he was trying out different identities. Iroh had let himself get spooked into overreacting. He had to remember the spirits' wisdom: that everything always turned out alright in the end.

.

By lunchtime, the state of things was this: Pakku had spoken with Tarao. Katara and Aang sat together applying Zuko's personality-sorting system to everyone they knew. Iroh enjoyed a nap. Zuko practiced riding on waves, often bursting out in laughter that sounded very similar to mad cackling. Kalika and Yagoda caught each other up on the latest gossip, and Sokka asked Yue some hard questions.

"So, about the necklace…"

Yagoda leaned forward. "Who is it?"

"The situation is a little more complicated than usual," Kalika replied. "She's not technically engaged because the necklace technically isn't an engagement necklace and the moment when she received it wasn't technically a proposal. But Lee, that guy we saved, gave it to her at an emotionally climactic moment which redefined their relationship, so practically speaking…"

"But she said she hated him!"

"Yeah, their relationship is complicated. Affection, concern, paranoia, hatred, trust, distrust, scheming…they've got it all."

Yagoda was hooked. "Don't stop there! Surely there are some details you can tell me?"

"Doctor's confidentiality." Kalika laughed. The pained look on Yagoda's face was priceless!

"You mischievous little sprite!" the old woman scolded. "I will have to keep secret the rumors I've heard about him."

Kalika stopped laughing. "About Lee? No, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it."

"Too late!"

"Please tell me the rumors."

"Only if I hear some juicy details."

"Lee likes to shift into different personas depending on the demands of the situation. That's how their relationship can be so complicated; it's as if he was more than one person. Now tell me what you've heard."

Yagoda pursed her lips and thought. Finally, she said, "I've heard three stories so far. People are saying that he is a spirit, that he bends spirits, and that he's here to train under a spirit. Nobody knows which or even how many of the stories are true. I've met many people who believe all three. And the rumors appeared all at once - the farthest back I can trace them is lunchtime yesterday. 24 hours."

"Huh. I may have a lead on the source of these rumors. He talked with a girl about spirit-related stuff. I don't know what the relation is, so no, I don't know which of the stories are true. But that girl probably spread the rumors after she talked to him. I don't know her name. All he said is that she acted awkward, nervous and unconfident, but also innocent." That was what she guessed Lee would have acted like as a young boy.

"That describes a lot of young women in the tribe," Yagoda said with a sigh. Then she perked up. "All of these rumors came from one story? And it was told only 24 hours ago? That doesn't leave a lot of time for the rumor mill to exaggerate or distort the facts. It must have been some story!"

"Oh, yeah. Lee is fantastic. I mean that in all definitions of the word."

"You're not going to tell me the best parts, are you?"

"Nope! Doctor's confidentiality."

"Sometimes I hate that."

Meanwhile, Sokka asked Yue some questions. He was careful to phrase them as diplomatically as he could. Recent past experiences had taught him how fearsome a woman's wrath could be. "Do girls see things in more complicated ways than guys? I mean, I call it like it is. If a thing is a thing, then I call it a thing. But Katara and her new doctor friend, they don't do that. They think it might not really be the thing it appears to be, or it's more than just that thing, or there's some kind of complicated story to explain why it is that thing and they have to know the whole story before they'll call it anything at all. You know what I mean?"

"I'm not sure."

Sokka waved his hands in circles. "Well, say some guy is acting like a jerk. I call him a jerk. But Katara and her friend, they say he's not really being a jerk, but doing something else that happens to look a whole lot like being a jerk, and I'm not allowed to yell at him for it or demand he stop being a jerk until we know the full story behind his jerkishness, or else I'm being unfair. I don't get it."

"You're right. It's more complicated for women. If you have a problem with another guy, you can just punch him. We can't do that. We have more complicated ways of solving our problems."

"I understand." Sokka placed his hands beside him on the fountain where they sat and leaned back. He swung his legs back and forth. "I guess my complaint is that they're asking me to go along with it. I don't play by those rules. I want to just punch him. But everybody else says I'm not allowed to."

"Do you ever see him when your sister isn't around?"

Sokka's legs stopped swinging. "Now that you mention it, I do not."

"If you ever do, you can punch him then. I think she doesn't want you to punch him in mixed company just because she doesn't want to get involved in a fistfight."

Sokka grunted. He swung his legs sharply, almost kicking them. She had given him a good answer to the problem he'd presented. Her answer did not satisfy him. He'd presented the wrong problem. "That wouldn't fix anything. I was wrong. I don't just want to punch him. I want to stand up to him. I want to tell him he's being a jerk and that he has to stop it. No excuses. No bargaining. Just take personal responsibility for once and stop being a jerk. This guy never accepts responsibility for anything. It's always someone else's fault. And she's playing right into it! Can't they see they're encouraging him?"

"I don't know who you're talking about, so I can't say."

"It's Lee. That guy we came here with. Super short black hair, fancy white clothes, big scar over his left eye?"

Yue's eyes widened. "I know him! I talked to him once. He seemed nice and friendly."

"He's good at hiding who he really is. If he thinks you're beneath him or you spend enough time with him, that's when his true self comes out."

Yue looked downcast. "I've known some people like that. I thought they were my friends. Turned out they weren't."

Sokka nodded. "He's exactly like that."

"Just stay away from him. If there's one thing I learned from that experience, it's that those kinds of people aren't worth your time."

"Can you come over and say that? I know it, but nobody listens to me."

Yue nodded. "I will. When would be a good time?"