A/N: FINALLY!!! It is finished!! My God, this was the longest story I have ever written! And I thought eleven chapters was a long story. Check it out! 17!!!! XD
Enjoy!
Epilogue—It Was Only a Dream
He was being whipped again. The searing pain from the end of the leather whip biting into his skin erupted malevolently all over his back. Zuko's screeches could be heard from all across Auschwitz as Azula punished him for the fifth time since he had arrived there. He had tried to escape for the second time, and for the second time, got caught. The first time his sister burned his face with an oil lamp and this time, his punishment was for to be flogged until he could no longer move or speak.
Zuko tried bravely not to cry out in pain but the combined pain from the old and inflamed wounds and the new injuries was enough to make him collapse unconscious. He did not and concentrated all his efforts to clinging to consciousness as best he could.
Finally, after what seemed like ages, Azula's incessant flogging ceased and he was able to breathe a sigh of relief from the short break.
"You should know not to attempt to escape, brother," she told him.
He stiffly turned his head to look at her. "I know," he replied angrily. "That does not mean that I will ever stop."
Her eyebrows knitted together and fury. "You will never leave this facility until I send you to your execution!" Drawing back her arm, she flew the whip at him once again. He felt his flesh getting torn from his bones and he screamed in agony. He should have known better than to talk smartly to his sister, but he just could not help himself. She just walked right into every trap.
When she finally stopped once again, he was teetering on the edge of unconsciousness. Zuko could just barely make out what Azula was saying to the guards who took him down from his shackles.
"Take him down to the scientists. I'm sure they would be delighted to have a new experiment to work on."
The German was too weak and feeble to fight back against the tall, strong guards who dragged him from his cell. He knew where they were taking him and dreaded every moment of the way there. As blurry as his vision was, he could still tell where he was. First he was outside in the cool, fresh air. He marveled in the feel of the cool breeze on his bloody cheeks but was soon cut off by the guards taking him inside another building. Zuko's feet stumbled and tripped frequently from the struggle to keep up with the pace of his escorts. He could feel himself stumble when they arrived at the top of a flight of stairs. As they descended it was all he could do to keep his body upright and not fall forward onto his face. When they finally stopped walking, he knew they had taken him underground.
He looked up to see a solid metal door open in front of him. As soon as it was completely open, he was dragged inside the dark room. Zuko thought he saw many shiny tools, some sharp, some blunt, others he had no idea what they were. They looked so strange to him. Before he could get a clearer look at them, his heart began to race with fear when he was grabbed by the shoulders and forced onto a cold, steel lab table and fastened tightly to it by thick, leather straps.
"No!" he cried out in horror and he began to struggle violently. A voice sounded from the shadows from a man Zuko could not see and the two guards roughly grabbed him and held him firmly to the table. When two sharp tools came into view, his struggles became more and more pronounced from the panic that was welling up inside him.
"Hold him tightly!" someone bellowed at the two guards as the sharp tools came closer and closer to his eyes. The guards did as they were told and Zuko shut his eyes tightly, hopping that the tools would just go away. He was disappointed to find that they did not when he felt the pointed tips of the tools attempt to pry his eyelids open. In a desperate attempt to keep the doctor at bay, he squeezed his lids tighter, but to no avail. His eyes were pried open and held there. He darted his irises around the room madly. He was surprisingly wide awake and aware of everything happening around him. He tried to yell again but a rough cloth was shoved into his mouth and all that came out was a muffle scream.
His eyes soon began to dry out and he vainly tried to blink but opened them quickly from the pain of the cold, metal tools holding his lids open. Suddenly, the sound of a circular saw could be heard from somewhere out of his line of vision and then a sharp searing pain erupted from his right hand. The pain was so intense he almost did not feel his skin being torn open and little sticks prodding curiously at the bones and tissue that held his hand together.
His jaw bit down hard on the cloth in his mouth and it was soon soaked clean through from his saliva. Some of it dribbled down his throat as he began to hyperventilate in a vain attempt to keep the pain at bay. Soon his left hand was cut open as by the circular saw and the bones, tissue, and muscle was prodded in that hand as well. His breathing increased as he constantly repeated the phrase "it's just a dream" in his head many times. The dryness of his eyes got to him as soon as his first hand was torn open. His eyes felt like sandpaper and every effort to blink brought more and more pain upon him.
It was not until a long, flat, and sharp object Zuko thought might have been a sword or bayonet, did his will fail him and he blacked out.
---
Zuko sat bold upright in bed screaming at the top of his lungs. His body was drenched in sweat and he was breathing rapidly. He could still feel his heart pounding against his ribcage but it soon dissipated to merely a normal dull, quiet thump as he tried to bring his breathing under control. Glancing around the room, he saw the dark shapes of a dresser, a wooden rocking chair, a baby's cradle in the far corner of the room, and the slightly open door that led to the rest of the house from the large bedroom he was in. He looked down at the woman who lay next to him, her eyes open and staring up at him with concern.
It really had been a dream, Zuko was never taken underground to the doctor's lab for an experiment and his first attempt at escaping had been a success. Clutching his forehead, he rubbed his temples and lay back down on the pillow. His eyes wandered to the window where he could see white snow falling silently in the moonlit, Russian night.
"Another nightmare?" his wife asked him, worry in her voice.
He nodded. "Yes Katara," he replied. "It was another nightmare." He turned to look into her large, blue eyes. "I hope I didn't wake the baby with my screaming."
His gypsy wife rolled over to look at the cradle. "No, I think he's fine."
He sighed in relief. "That's good. I just wish these dreams would stop." He pulled the covers back over his bare shoulder and kissed Katara on the cheek. "I haven't had a decent night's sleep in quite some time."
"Not since the war ended. Almost every night I can here you moaning pleas in your sleep. Your nights are fitful and you usually always wake up screaming and sweaty." She paused and touched her hand to his face where the burn scar from the oil lamp still remained. "Do you think these nightmares will ever end?"
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I don't know, Katara. It seems with every dream, the next one feels even more realistic than the one before it." She removed her hand from his face and nestled deep into her pillow and as he watched, her breathing eased into a more comfortable rhythm that indicated she had fallen asleep. "Perhaps when I stop blaming myself for the death of millions, they will stop."
Nodded to that conclusion, he draped his arm around his wife's slender body and fell asleep to more peaceful and pleasant dreams.
---
The German walked up to his brother-in-law and shook his hand briskly. "Congratulations, Sokka!" he said happily. The Gypsy nodded once in thanks. The ceremony had been long, but it had been worth it. After his many triumphs in the Second World War in the Russian army, today he had been awarded the highest honor the country could bestow on him.
"Thank you, Zuko," he said in return. "You know, you could have been up there with me getting a medal. How come you decided not to join the Russian Army and fight against the Nazis?"
Zuko shrugged and wrapped his arm around Katara. He smiled at her and she returned his smile joyously. "Well, you know. After one military mess-up, I decided I was done with the Army. Plus I don't think I would have gotten along well with any of the soldiers here. You remember how Jet treated me?"
Sokka nodded his agreement. "Yeah, he really didn't like you, did he?" The three of them made their way through the crowd that had gathered for the after-party of Sokka's pinning ceremony. Many others came up to congratulate Sokka and it was not long until Suki came barreling thought the crowd to tackle her husband around the waist and knock him to the ground.
"I am so proud of you!" she cried out, kissing him many times over on the cheek. Sokka hugged his wife tightly as he attempted to sit up and regain at least a bit of his dignity. Toph and Aang came up behind Suki and laughed out loud at Sokka's misfortune. Toph was wearing a rather fancy dress Aang had picked out for her. She kept feeling her hands down the skirts and grumbling but otherwise kept her complaints about the dress to herself while Aang wore a plain black suit with a heavy winter coat draped over his shoulders.
"We're all proud of you," Aang piped up when they arrived.
When Sokka had finally managed to get back on his feet, he walked over to his sister and bent over the baby she held in her arms. "And how is my little nephew?" he asked, tickling the baby's nose with his index finger. The baby stretched and yawned without opening his eyes but otherwise was not aware of the man who stood over him.
"Young Adrian is quite the stubborn little boy," Katara answered with a smile on her face. "He's just like his father."
Zuko knew what she was referring to and blushed madly at the look on her face. The boy may look just like his mother, but in personality, he was just like Zuko. The event Katara had been referring to when she said Adrian was just like his father was the moment he and Katara had first met, when the rest of his life was changed forever. When he had refused to let Zhao rape the poor, defenseless gypsy girl they had come to imprison.
"Didn't he have a death grip on that cookie you caught him with?" Toph asked, staring blankly in front of her. She had a slight smirk on her face when she spoke. "I seem to remember him screaming Bloody Mary when you got it away from him."
Katara smiled. "That was the first tip I got telling me he was his father's son."
Suki sniggered. "I wish I could have a child like that," she said as she nudged Sokka in the ribs. "But mister seasick over here refuses to have kids, complaining that they'll just turn out to be little monsters."
Sokka frowned at his wife's statement. "That was one time and I'll have you know I have not been seasick since then!"
The whole group burst out laughing at Sokka's defiant face which quickly turned into one of embarrassment.
"That was priceless," Aang said through fits of laughter. "Remember when the bird pooped on his face? My stomach hurt for days after that."
Zuko chuckled quietly. He had been told the story several times the moment he had returned to the group in Sweden. He had laughed harder than he could ever remember laughing but he still wished he could have been there when it happened. It sounded like it would have been funnier if he had seen it in person. Glancing at Toph, he knew the young blind girl held his exact wishes. Not being able to see must feel like a curse sometimes.
"Hey, we should make our way over to the buffet table real soon," he heard Sokka say as he placed a hand to his stomach. "I could use some of that cake they made for me, I'm starving."
Suki rolled her eyes. "That's just like you," she said, taking his hand and leading him through the quickly dispersing crowd. "Always thinking with your stomach."
"Hey!" her husband cried as he allowed her to lead him off to the buffet table. "I think with my brain, too!"
She raised an eyebrow. "Yeah? When?"
Zuko and Katara followed the two as Sokka seemed at a loss for words, unable to answer his wife's question. The man could not remember the last time he had thought with his brain. Toph and Aang soon followed behind them as Zuko took his son in his arms and held him tightly. A tuft of brown hair could be seen growing from the top of Adrian's head.
When they arrived in the next room, Katara had Zuko sit down with their son to save them seat while she and the rest of the group went to get food. They were not gone too long and soon he was surrounded by his new family. Toph and Aang sat next to each other given that the two couples in the group only left two seats left at the table that happened to be right next to each other. The German enjoyed feeding his son food when Adrian reached out to the food, indicated he wanted some. Of course, when Adrian reached for his glass of wine, he had to deny his baby son any of it. Alcohol was not something he would willingly give young children.
They remained at the after party for a few more hours until young Adrian grew tired and fell asleep in his father's arms. He nudged Katara who was conversing with Suki and silently told her it was time to go home. She nodded, said her goodbyes and left the building with her husband. The snow was not falling but it did cover the roads quite a bit and their drive home was slow since Zuko did not want to endanger his family by driving too fast. Given the weather, the tires on the automobile would slip easily.
"I noticed that Jet was abnormally kind to you today," Katara said when they arrived at their small house at the edge of the town. "Was it just me, or was he actually starting to treat you like a friend?"
Zuko smiled at his wife when they walked up to the front door to their house. "It was just a show," he replied. "Because he was surrounded by his superiors, he had to pretend that he liked me. Otherwise he would get chewed out."
"I see," his wife replied. She was silent while her husband unlocked the front door and opened it, standing aside to let her and the baby inside first. Zuko hung up his coat and went right to his bedroom while Katara placed the baby in his cradle that they moved to the living room. He was exhausted. His time in Auschwitz had left him physically less capable than he had been beforehand. That was something he had refused to tell Sokka when asked why he did not join the Russian army. It was not just because he figured he was done with the military, it was because his body was done with the military. If he had been physically capable, he would have joined with Sokka in heartbeat. But the weeks of starvation and beatings had rendered him quite incapable.
He sat down with a sigh on the bed he and Katara shared and brought a hand to the scar that covered half his face. The skin here was smooth with no pores to allow for hair to grow or blemishes to appear. In a sense, it was a nice thing to have. It showed that he could withstand anything someone threw his way. But it was also a scar on his memories as well as his skin. He hated how people would stop and stare and make little comments under their breath about how it must have hurt to get a scar like that. They thought he could not hear them, but he could hear every word. It pained him to remember how he got it, how his sister had smashed the oil lamp in his face then keeled over with a bullet hole in her forehead just before she was about to kill him.
He let out another sigh and glanced over to the mirror across from the door to see his wife standing in the doorway, leaning against the door frame. "There's nothing you can do about it. You know that, right?" He turned to look at her and nodded.
"I know. I just wish there was sometimes." Katara walked across the room to sit next to him on the bed.
"Well if you can't get rid of it," she said. "Maybe you can learn to live with it." He glanced at her to see a small smile on her lips. "If it's any consolation, I think you look really hansom with it."
He chuckled. "It is of great satisfaction to me to hear you say that, Katara." He spoke as he absentmindedly leaned closer to her. He leaned his head to the side to look at her. "That is why I married you."
Her smile grew bigger and she leaned in and kissed his lips. "I do hope you married me because you love me, too."
It was his turn to smile. "Of course, that too." She laughed and fell on her back on the bed. He followed her and they lay there for a few minutes in silence before Zuko spoke again. "You know, you're right, Katara," he said, breaking the silence. "I will learn to live with this scar."
She smiled and rolled over to lie on top of his chest. "That's good, maybe your nightmares will cease to exist once you come to terms with it."
"Maybe they will," he said and stretched his neck up to kiss her. She returned his kiss as he rolled her over so he was on top of her. "I love you, Katara."
"And I love you, Zuko," she replied as his fingers began to wrap themselves around the buttons of her dress. She, in turn, started pulling his shirt out from being tucked into his pants.
Meanwhile, young Adrian was sound asleep, unaware of what his parents were doing in their bedroom.
A/N: Yeah, my imagination is basically shot at this point. I am so tired of this story, I am so glad it's finished.
Bleh, please excuse me while I go hang myself. I've basically just used up my entire imagination just for this story.
Now I must turn my attentions to other fandoms and stories. Maybe a few oneshots or original stories will help me recover.
Review, please!