"You miscalculated, I love Zuko more than I fear you!"

She didn't show it, but it was in her eyes. The consequences of Mai's actions were irrefutable. Azula had seen the assassin as a comrade, the closest she ever allowed to a friend. The Princess had even confided in her that she had dared to begin to care for the assassin. Ty Lee had felt like doing flips in the air upon hearing the Princess's confession. Things were good, they could be happy.

But Mai chose Zuko, a secret and debilitating fear of the Princess. The words that hit her ears only confirmed what she had told herself all along. She wasn't loved. She couldn't be; she was a monster.

The thought only flashed through her mind for a mere second before she felt her face scrunch into the cruelest glare imaginable. She wasn't thinking anymore, friendship wasn't something that mattered. She'd been taught that, and the cold assassin before her only made her father's engrave deeper into her skin.

Azula's arms rose without a thought as her body dropped into its all too familiar stance. Anger and pain were rising in her blood, mixing with every beat of her heart and materialized in the charged sparks that were leaping from her fingertips. She could hear her father's voice in her ear, "Friends are useless, people are only worthwhile if you can control them."

The words seethed and hissed in her mind and made her ears burn hot. Mai was such a failure after all, her and her worthless brother Zuko. It should have always just been her and Ty Lee. She glanced at her acrobat for a split second, barely catching the building fear in her grey eyes. She may have even hesitated at the pain her acrobat felt, but hesitation was not something Azula ever did. Forgiveness and leniency were not among her abilities either.

"No YOU miscalculated! You should have feared me more!"

Lighting flared from her fingers as she whipped her arms decisively through the air.

A pink blur appeared before her, rather than blue flashes.

She didn't even feel a thing as she fell to the ground.

Azula was confused. That's not how an attack felt, unleashed from her fingertips. She hadn't heard the satisfying crack of thunder, nor felt the surge of power through her being. She didn't see Mai, lifeless on the ground.

The eyes of the princess traveled upwards from her position, crumpled on the ground. Ty Lee, her Ty Lee stood above her gazing down. Grey, water filled eyes met amber eyes of disbelief and time stopped between them. So many emotions, questions, and explanations passed between them in a single second. Azula wished she could have stayed in that moment, would have given anything to stay there with Ty Lee.

But the tears were already falling from Ty Lee's eyes, streaming down her soft cheeks now strained with regret and sorrow. And Azula felt hot breath enter her lungs as splintering agony filled her chest. She gasped and sputtered, trying to breathe in her flames again, but with every breath stabs of pain pierced her. The fallen Princess thrashed, realizing her limbs were also paralyzed, consequently from Ty Lee's attack, Ty Lee's attack on her. Ty Lee turned on her. The realization clicked in the gears of her mind and the logic of the situation was revealed. Ty Lee chose Mai. Not her.

Grey eyes now met glistening golden ones, and two hearts shattered irrevocably in an instant.