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Zuko kicked at a charred piece of wood muttering darkly as marched in the burnt down forest. He and Zhou had a bit of a spat...a very big spat. The coward was gone, and so was the Avatar. Escaping narrowly once again. He took another step and someone gave out a sharp cry. Jumping back he saw a hand, shaking and clenching under a log. Flipping it over with ease, he frowned at what he saw.
"You're that water tribe boy."
The young teen, who Zuko assumed was his age, was looking up at him with his pale blue eyes. His normally tan skin seemed coated with gray ash, and his cracked and bleeding lips stood out against his skin. His chest was burned, and Zuko could not determine what was clothes, and what was skin. He was bleeding out, and Zuko knew, that all you could do for that wound, was wait for it to stop bleeding, and the injured to die. Zuko shook his head, and would have walked on when a soft sound hit his ears.
"Please..."
Zuko turned staring at the young teen. The teen stared anxiously at him, eyes wide, "Please...please...stay...I don't," he took in a sharp gasp and began coughing, blood flickering faster out of his chest. "I don't want to die...by myself..." Zuko felt like laughing at the poor excuse of a..."No you're not a man." Zuko suddenly whispered, startling them both.
Zuko let his eyes meet with the teen. The TEEN. Just like him. His father's words, of telling him to be a man after he burnt him, echoed in his head. He stared at the young teen, and sat down suddenly. Zuko watched relief fill up the teen's face, and he held up his hand. "Sokka." He whispered looking at him with those pale blue eyes. Zuko shook his hand, "Zuko."
They sat in silence. At one point Zuko tried to help stop the bleeding, but Sokka's loud screams were so startling, and terrible that he stopped, and let the blood stay on his hands. "How'd this happen?" Zuko asked the silence. "A guy..." Sokka wheezed, "Ugly BXstard...limping..." Zuko nodded. That was Zhou. He'd been stabbed in the leg before making his escape.
"Saw Aang...and..sis...I grabbed him..." Sokka gasped loudly, whole body shaking, "pain." Zuko pat his shoulder, "Shut up stupid. I get it. You're gonna kill yourself by talking." Sokka's eyes locked with Zuko, "As...as if I ever had a chance to survive." At that last breathy statement Zuko felt a cold shock run through him.
How many people had this thought? How many had Zuko killed, had anyone killed in this world, and that sentence popped in their head? It was cold feeling, the cold feeling of realizing he wasn't the only person who could feel. Sokka noticed his shock, and out of instinct, he reached out, and took Zuko's warm hand.
The cold hand in Zuko's stunned the prince. Again he was blown away by something unexpected, something that hadn't crossed his mind. Why was this guy, his enemy for almost a year now, holding his hand to give him comfort, when he was the one dying? "Sokka...why are we having this war? Do you know what started it?" Zuko asked staring helplessly at the dying teen.
"No...I...I thought the fire benders..." Sokka gasped, and began shaking. Quickly Zuko came behind him and placed his head in his lap. He held the teen, knowing all he could do was wait. Finally Sokka stilled and a hoarse whispered filled the air, "Knew." Zuko chuckled, "No...I doubt anyone knows..." Sokka looked up at Zuko, and with his cold, cold hands, touched his scarred face. The cool touch felt good to Zuko's waxy flesh. His burn had never stopped aching until that touch.
'Is this the only way for me to feel better? Do I need the cool hand of death to ease my pain?' Zuko thought, reeling from all the new things he was discovering. All these Revelations hitting him because of this boy's upcoming death? Sokka dropped his hand, and looked at him with his pale eyes. "We...would've been friend...friends." Sokka stated, not asked, stated. He knew, and Zuko knew.
"Yes...you stupid boy."
Sokka wheezed, but Zuko had a feeling he was laughing at him. Sokka looked away from Zuko, and whispered, "I've never...never felt so awake in my life...as if something new is happening...I guess..." Sokka let out a sigh, and looked up at Zuko, "My sister..." Zuko looked at the boy, whose pale blue eyes were growing paler. "She'll know. I'll deliver you to her." A smile lit Sokka's face, and he coughed, the blood in his chest spurting again. Zuko suddenly grabbed it, wishing he had tried harder to contain it.
Sokka continued coughing, and did not cry out from pain as Zuko held his limp frame to him. "Don't...not yet." Sokka could not hear him, and he was coughing harder, and louder. Zuko's hands were pressed flat against his bleeding chest, and both were dyed red. Sokka could here nothing, a loud stillness had filled his senses. He was aware of his breathing, and the hands clutching him, and clinging to him. It was then, that it was all over.
Zuko stopped clinging to him and released him, as if he was holding something that burned him. Sokka slumped over falling in an undignified matter, and stayed there, not moving. He was dead. Zuko rose and fled the clearing as if it was cursed leaving the boy bend over in his own blood. It was twenty minutes later when Zuko came running back, and clutched the younger teen to him. He smoothed his hair, over and over, and whispered apologies in his hair.
He scooped the boy up, the one who had brought forth all these new ideas in his head and carried him to his uncle, and to his men. In their captivity was the Avatar and the girl. The struggled, against captivity, and Zuko cried, "LET THEM GO!" All stilled and the two were released, not from the command, but from the tears streaming down Zuko's face.
Aang and Katara stared at him, in a wild sense of shock. Carrying the rag doll that was once a human being, capable of thoughts, feelings, and love, he thrust him into the girl's and boy's arms, and said, "He is dead, now go." He turned away from the sister's screaming, and the voice of the sobbing Avatar encouraging her to run. He did not turn until the voices of his men reached his ears.
He finally turned, and looked at the spot where the prisoners and the dead had been. He glanced down and saw the same strange weapon that Sokka had tried to use on him when they first met. He picked up the boomerang like weapon, and examined it. With out so much as a word he tucked it into his belt, and walked back aboard his ship.