Disclaimer: I don't own Avatar, this stuff doesn't bring me a cent, please don't bother me with a lawsuit.
A/N: Azula came back into the past once. She had lost the battle against Zuko and Katara and become crazy, but somehow she was sent back right after "killing" the Avatar. She made sure he was dead this time around and everything went fine for the Fire Nation, she knew her enemies' plans in advance.
What she didn't know was what Phoenix King Ozai, the father she had sided with from childhood, the man she had brought victory to, the parent she had chosen to listen to, would do with her once the victory would be secured.
Once Ozai had burnt down most of the Earth Kingdom during Sozin's Comet, he came back to the Fire Nation palace, declared the Fire Nation obsolete and took back Azula's Fire Lord headpiece. This was only the beginning of her tragic destiny, as he decided that she was the best mother for the next generation of fire bending prodigies who would carry on his legacy.
Azula was forcefully wed to her own father and when the pregnancy failed, he burned her mid section until there was nothing left of her failing uterus.
After a long agony, Azula came back to the moment right after she had made sure the Avatar would stay dead. Traumatized, she was barely able to think that this time, she would choose a different path…
X
Chapter 1
"AAAAAAARGH!" screamed Azula as the Avatar fell to the ground, his whole body burnt by her lightning bolt.
She fell too, to everyone's surprise, clutching her belly around her uterus as she remembered her agony from before her death. She cried in phantom pain, curled in a foetal position.
As Aang's group escaped, Zuko rushed to his sister's side, worried for her. Was it a side effect of killing the Avatar in the Avatar state? No one had ever accomplished that before, so no one knew what could result from that.
"Azula! What happened?" he asked frantically, her state forcing him to put aside the event of the death of the last hope of stopping the Fire Nation, of stopping his father.
She didn't answer him, the trauma from earlier still affecting her mind.
Zuko carried her, lead by the Dai Li to a fancy bedroom. They brought a doctor who examined her but found nothing.
"I don't know what Queen Azula is suffering from," he explained. "She seems to suffer psychological damage, but I couldn't tell you if it's linked to the events of the day. Has she been through a traumatic event recently, or even today?"
"Apart from killing the Avatar while he was in the Avatar state? Nothing that I know of. Maybe her friends Ty Lee and Mai know more about that? Dai Li, bring them here!"
The agents considered him temporarily in charge and obeyed his command. They came back with the two girls five minutes later.
"What happened?" exclaimed Ty Lee as they entered the bedroom.
"Did she finally bite more than she could chew?" asked Mai.
"When she killed the Avatar…" started Zuko.
"She killed him?" cut Ty Lee in surprise.
"Stop interrupting me! When she killed him while he was in the Avatar state, she suddenly clutched her belly and curled up like that while screaming in pain. The doctor found no physical issue with her and asked if she's recently been through a traumatic event. Do you know about anything that could be related?"
The girls exchanges glances and shook their heads negatively in tandem.
"Everything always goes how Azula wants it to," precised Mai.
The doctor approached them and asked:
"Was she pregnant at some point? She seems to be suffering from the area around her uterus, either from a trauma or from phantom pain. Did she lose a child?"
All of them exchanged astonished glances.
"No!" they shouted in unison.
"She's only fourteen!" Zuko added.
"She could have been abused by someone she was afraid of denouncing…?" suggested the medic.
"…Do you think your father…?" started Mai to Zuko.
"He's not a kind father by any means, but I don't think he'd do anything to Azula! She was always his favorite…"
Zuko's eyes widened at his own words.
"And she was a girl…a firebending prodigy…he wanted to make a line of powerful firebenders to succeed him…always obsessed with power…"
His own reasoning was starting to get seriously disturbing.
"It can't be…can it? Could he…?"
Mai rushed to his support.
"I don't think so… Even for him, it seems unlikely…"
"You're right. He couldn't have done that… He's not a monster…" Zuko tried to persuade himself.
Mai walked him to an armchair where she sat him. She brought a chair to his side so she would watch him while he watched his sister. As strange as the events had turned out, Mai realized that she still had feelings for Zuko after all these years away from each other. He was still a caring boy, despite the bad influences in his life…
Ty Lee let them for now, using this moment to get some free time for herself, something she'd been deprived of thanks to Azula…
X
It took three days for the new Earth Queen to be able to speak without breaking down again. She had been through a fever due to her mental condition affecting her body.
When she finally came back to her senses with enough sanity to realize where and when she was, she immediately removed her clothes. Zuko, brought to attention by her sudden movement, was worried when he saw her removing everything she was wearing, not understanding what she was trying to do.
Hesitating due to the weirdness of the situation, he finally rushed towards her and hugged her to offer some comfort.
"I'm here, Azula… I don't know what happened to you, but I'm here… You can tell me anything… Was it…did father do something to you?"
He had to ask. He had turned the question in his head for three days and couldn't keep his curiosity in check. He wanted to be sure if his father was a monster or not.
At the mention of the man, Azula reacted in reflex. She cried and placed her hand back onto her belly. She felt no scar, no burn and looked down, seeing that there was nothing.
"That's right…" she said in a weird kind of relief, "I'm back… I'm back… It hasn't happened…yet…"
Her brother was wondering what she was trying to say. It made little sense to anyone not in her head.
"What happened Azula? Why are you crying? Why did you suddenly fall in pain after the events in the prison?"
She looked at him with a look that was quite disturbing.
"You're back too… I'm still… You haven't betrayed me…not yet… That's right, haha… You're still alive…HAhahahaha! How ironic… to be helped by the one I've killed and betrayed by the one I've supported all my life… HAhahahaha!"
Zuko felt uneasy. It looked like his sister was having a mental breakdown. She was saying crazy things and laughing like a patient of an asylum, it was getting scary.
"Zuzu…promise me!"
"Promise you what?"
"That you won't betray me this time!" she had a look of madness induced worry and sadness.
"I just…I just chose you over my own redemption…I won't go anywhere without knowing you're fine and safe… we've already been torn apart for too long…"
Azula seemed to calm down, but she had tears falling again when she looked at him with the eyes of someone who'd been rejected all their lives suddenly being accepted. Zuko could relate to that and embraced her tightly, making up for all the times he'd been absent from her life, for leaving her behind with their father, to be his project.
"Can I tell you something…?" she asked, insecure about what she wanted to tell him.
"Of course! Tell me everything!"
"…Ozai…" she couldn't call him father anymore. Not after what he'd done to her, even if he hadn't done it yet in this timeline. "I chose him. Twice. I chose him over you, over my friends… I was lonely, but I thought he'd be proud of me… And I was right…he was proud of me, the second time, when we won the war… He was…so proud…that he destroyed…the royal hairpin he had given to me…and made me…his wife…"
"What are you talking about?" asked Zuko, confused.
"This is my third chance, Zuzu…I've already failed twice… The first time, you and Katara beat me while the Avatar removed Ozai's bending… The second time, I made sure the Avatar was really dead…and I knew your plans…so we defeated you all…I killed you and…Ozai destroyed the Earth Kingdom…and I ended up alone with him…he abused me…"
She broke into tears, but she wanted to get to the end of this and be done with it. She wanted to tell this so that she'd be free from it, from the guilt and the memories. She wanted to be able to never have to remind herself of what had happened during her second chance…
"I was bearing…Ozai's child…and it died… He accused me…of killing our child…he was so angry… He burned me…from the skin…to the uterus…because I had failed him…down there…"
Zuko was torn between worry for her mental state and fury for what she was telling him.
"But…that's impossible! The war is still raging! The Avatar may be dead, but we haven't won yet!"
"I don't know…! …It's like someone refuses to let me die…! …Or fail… Or whatever! I'm stuck in a loop! I failed once, got back, Ozai killed me, I agonized for hours ad then I came back again! Please, Zuko! Believe me!"
"…You've received a letter from Fire Lord Ozai…" he said, checking if her reaction to the man was genuine.
Azula cowered and cried again at the mention of his name.
"I don't wanna be anywhere near that bastard!" she screamed, her face showing her terror of the man. "I don't wanna go! I don't wanna go! Please don't make me go! Don't let him come! He… He must die! Yes! That's the only way! He has to die! That's the only way to get free from the loop! The only way to stop dying or being betrayed by everyone and coming back!"
Zuko, freaked out, called the doctor. The man sedated the Queen whose dignity was hidden under the covers after the prince had thought about her nudity.
Azula felt betrayed, but she fell asleep.
X
"Are you two sure she was never assaulted by Ozai?" asked Zuko for the third time to the girls.
"Yes, Zuko! We're sure she wasn't in the time we've been around her! We haven't seen her for two years after your banishment and she only came to look for us when she was hunting you down!" Mai shouted, her patience worn down.
They were in a soundproof meeting room.
"…Sorry…but she was so terrified just by his name…! It felt genuine… She told me…that she bore his child and lost it…and that he…burned her to the uterus…in anger… But she doesn't have a scar!"
"Maybe she made a prophetic dream?" suggested a worried Ty Lee.
"From what she told me, if that's the case, then she did two in the short moment when she killed the Avatar…it seems unlikely that she could have two dreams in one second!"
"Tell us what she dreamed of," encouraged Mai.
"She dreamed that everyone betrayed her and that she lost the war. Then she pretends she came back when she killed the Avatar and made sure he was really dead this time…which she did three days ago, so that at least is true… Then she was still betrayed by us, killed me while Ozai destroyed the Earth Kingdom and then he took her royal hairpin off and forcefully wed her and I've already told you the rest… I feel sick just by thinking of that…"
"It can't have been in the past, she never wore the royal hairpin," noted Mai.
"But it could be her subconscious! Sometimes your dreams are the manifestation of your fears or suppressed memories," explained Ty Lee who seemed to have studied this question in depth despite her age.
"But it still doesn't explain how she'd have been able to have two dreams in the short time that she killed the Avatar!" exclaimed Zuko, his mind exhausted by the mental gymnastics.
"Whatever it was, let's consider it prophetic," decided Mai. "Did she say why we betrayed her?"
"No, but I mean…the war has been lasting for a century, I don't even know why the Fire Nation fights anymore…I understand that I could choose the other side eventually…"
"I only fight for the Fire Nation because Azula forced me to help her hunt you down," exclaimed Ty Lee.
"She threatened my baby brother's life," added Mai.
"She's always been kind of…crazy…" said Ty Lee, troubled about her choice.
"But she's still my sister…and I left her alone with him…"
"Zuko…he banished you, you couldn't do anything…" tried Mai.
He kicked a chair and left the room angry. Angry at the chair that had hurt his toes. Angry at Mai for trying to give him excuses. Angry at himself over everything else.
'I'll make it up to you, Azula,' he promised. 'I'm been a shitty brother until now…but I'll stay by your side from now on! Nothing bad will happen to you ever again! You're a little crazy sometimes, maybe you're a psychopath…but I'm still your big brother and I'll protect you from danger and from your own demons…I'll be your light in this dark pit you've fallen into, just like uncle Iroh has been for me…'
X
When Azula woke up, Mai shook Zuko's shoulder. He woke up and saw his sister awake. He rushed at her side and hugged her tightly.
Azula, who had felt betrayed by his calling the doctor to sedate her after looking at her like she was crazy, was surprised by this, but she was wary. He probably still didn't believe her. Maybe he had snitched! Zuko always snitched!
"You didn't snitch to Ozai! Did you?" she asked him, distressed.
"No! From now on I'll be your big brother! I'm gonna protect you from harm like I never did! I'm sorry for leaving you behind! I can't imagine how lonely you must've felt!"
Azula felt tears crawl down her cheeks. He understood her. Finally someone understood her and recognized her loneliness. He would stay with her, he wouldn't betray her. Not this time…
This time was the right one. This was her third chance and she wouldn't waste it.
Azula embraced her brother like she did when she was three and they comforted each other. They were finally back together, brother and sister. And they wouldn't follow Ozai's tyranny anymore. She would make sure of that.