She was sitting in the back room of the underground arena, fiddling with the bandages on her arms when Hariko came in.

"How are your arms?" He asked but she only shrugged, she hadn't been speaking much since they started going from town to town. With a heavy sigh he took the vacant spot next to her on the bench.

"Well Jong says you're ready, so once your arms heal you can fight if you want" he offered but Azula shook her head, and for the first time that week looked him in the eye.

"No, I'm done fighting." She told him

"Azula, it was an accident" he gently insisted

"I don't care. I'm done hurting people. I'm done fighting and I'm done bending, for good." She vowed.

Jong was furious, but he wasn't about to have his plans ruined by this minor set back.

"I'm sorry Azula," he muttered under his breath before turning to the other three and shouting, "Zhang, take her down!"

With a grin Zhang bent the earth below Azula's feet into a hole as his friends began taking on the guards, but of course Azula jumped out of the way.

"Come on Zhang, you'll have to do better than that" She taunted as her old friend dawned his signature rock gloves, an earthbending technique Azula was beginning to regret telling him about.

Jong and Lee were making quick work of the guards, while Xiao jumped in to help Zhang take down Azula. The guards were easy enough at first for the two non-benders to handle, even the firebending ones. But as more came and joined the fight the two men quickly found themselves outnumbered. To make matters worse Lee was chi-blocked and left without any use in either of his arms,

"Just great" Jong grumbled.

The only good thing that Azula could say had come out of her defiance so far was that Jong had not planned well for this event; clearly he had underestimated her again. Zhang and Xiao are both benders, Zhang an earthbender and Xiao a firebender. Jong must have thought that the two of them could subdue her easily and still have time to help him with the guards, but she was always better than he gave her credit for. Still, she refused to use her bending and, although she would never admit it, she had never been particularly skilled in hand-to-hand combat. Sure she had the basic knowledge, but it was never her strong point. That's why she always used her bending in a fight, to keep distance between her and her opponent. It's why on The Day of Black Sun she distracted the Avatar, Sokka, and that blind girl rather than fight them; and it was why she was losing now. She was holding her own but that wouldn't last long, for every hit she blocked she received a burn. She could barely see and she just knew they were backing her into a wall where Xiao would undoubtedly deliver a final blow of fire.

So much for having my back Azula thought bitterly to herself, though she knew that wasn't fair because there was no way Sokka had followed her all the way to the palace.

Just then, as if on a cue to prove her wrong, a shiny object came hurling through the sky and knocked the rocks clean off of Zhang's hand. The object returned to its owner, revealing itself to be Sokka's trusty boomerang. The tan skinned man from the Water Tribe was quick to join the fight, primarily taking on Zhang with his club while Azula handled Xiao. Looking over Azula noticed that Sokka didn't come alone; his blind friend, who Aula knew was now the chief of police in Republic City, was helping the guards take down Jong and Lee. She smirked at the sight; knowing Jong's plans were completely down the drain at this point, then she felt her back bump against someone.

"So you were being literal when you said you have my back?" She asked sarcastically as they fought back to back.

"I was hoping it wouldn't come to that-" Sokka began as he dodged an attack, "but yeah" he finished.

"Duck!" Azula shouted and Sokka did as he was ordered, though he was expecting a trail of fire to pass above his head, not Azula herself. She flew over him in the motion of a backflip, delivering a powerful kick to Zhang's jaw and knocking him off his feet.

"I never thought you and I would be fighting on the same side" she remarked as she landed.

Once she was clear from his path Sokka spun around and swung his club hard at Xiao's skull, effectively knocking the man unconscious.

"Me neither, it's a nice change of pace." He agreed, Azula smirked and was about to say something else when Zhang bent a pillar of rock out of the ground from behind her, smashing it into the back of her head and sending her into a world of total blackness.

"Azula!" Sokka shouted, instinctively catching her as she fell forward.

Zhang snickered as he got to his feet, "she always was the weak link" he taunted and Sokka found himself fighting back tears. Gently, he lowered Azula to the ground and lay her down, he was about to charge Zhang and teach him a lesson he wouldn't be able to forget even if he were to ever suffer from amnesia. But before he could Toph metal bent her handcuffs onto him and was there to hand him over to the guards. As the guards took away Jong and his gang Toph approached Sokka, who was still standing angrily over Azula's unconscious form.

"So, what should we do with her?" She questioned.

Sokka studied the girl in his arms as he carried her through the halls of the Fire Nation Palace. Originally he had only been doing so to assure himself that she was still breathing, which thankfully she was, but then he really began to take in her features. The first thing he noticed was how small she was. The way she had always carried herself, she had always seemed to be so intimidating. But now that he was holding her he realized that she hadn't grown much since fourteen and was just an inch or so shorter than Katara. Another reason he found her small was because she was very light, like almost scary light. Apart from muscle her body seemed to have nothing to it, and Sokka involuntarily thought back to when Mika told him they had been living in homeless shelters. She was still wearing the black clothing she had been when she showed up at his apartment, though now it was covered in a mixture of dirt and blood. Her face and arms were covered in cuts, scrapes, small burns, bruises; you name it Azula now had it. The one thing that really mesmerized Sokka was her face. She looked so peaceful sleeping in his arms; he couldn't believe that this woman was the same girl who he used to fear. Her pale face, though littered with minor injuries, was angelic to him. Her dark hair was halfway out of its ponytail and some of it dropped to give her face a frame. Her lips were crusted over with dry blood, fresh from the fight. He didn't understand. She was a fantastic bender, she could've taken both those guys with one hand tied behind her back had she used her bending, so why didn't she?

The attempt on his life hadn't completely surprised Zuko; he had learned to adjust to those long ago. The word that his sister was involved he had to admit was little bit more of a shock, but he'd be lying if he said the thought never once crossed his mind that someday the assassin would be her. However the news that she had broken into the palace courtyard only to give herself up and then be taken down by her friends, yeah that was something he never expected. Furthermore he didn't expect it to be his best friend from the Southern Water Tribe who carried her limp body inside as if to prove to him that this wasn't a dream. When he first laid eyes on Azula, her body so battered and broken, Zuko had wanted to take her from Sokka. He almost did, but the look Sokka had in eyes told him not to. It was a look he was sure Sokka wasn't meaning to give; a look of unconditional worry and fear. Almost like he felt that if Azula died then it would be his fault.

"Come on" Zuko said, motioning for Sokka to follow him down an old corridor the Fire Lord seldom went down, "we'll leave her in her room" he announced.

They walked down to Azula's old bedroom; it hadn't been touched since she ran away. Zuko pulled back the covers of her bed and allowed Sokka to lay her down, the two men then headed to the main living area to talk. At first it was quiet, neither of them knowing what to say.

"So how'd you know she was coming?" Zuko asked, knowing that it probably wasn't a coincidence that Sokka just happened to arrive at the palace only moments after the attack had begun.

But Sokka didn't answer the question, not at first, at first he just sighed before finally speaking. "Listen Zuko, I don't know what you're going to say to her when she wakes up, if you choose to speak to her at all. But you need to know that she didn't want to do this" he said, looking his friend in the eye. "She didn't want to come attack you, her friend Jong blackmailed her." He finished.

"Blackmailed her? What was he threatening?" Zuko demanded, although a part of him was glad to hear that Azula apparently hadn't been the instigator of this attack another part of him found that rather surprising, although it would explain why she gave herself up.

Sokka looked away from him, as if he weren't really sure if he should answer that question or not.

"Her daughter's life" he finally confessed.

If Zuko was surprised before he was really in shock now. Azula, his sister Azula, has a daughter?

"Yeah, I had about the same reaction" Sokka said, finally looking at Zuko to see that his face had paled and his eyes had involuntarily gone wide.

"How-" The completely stunned Fire Lord began

"Four" Sokka answered before his friend could finish the question. "She's four, her name is Mika." He said then was quiet, giving his friend time to take the information in.

Zuko nodded and considered asking Sokka about the girl's father, when a disturbing thought crossed his mind. Sokka somehow knew who had blackmailed Azula into coming here; he had carried her inside and, according to his guards and Toph, fought along side her in the courtyard. Not only did he know she had a daughter but he also knew both her name and age. Zuko knew that the two of them didn't talk much, but surely his friend would've told him if he had been seeing his sister for a few years now. Especially when he knew how worried Zuko and his whole family has been about what had happened to her. Right?

"Um, do you know about… her father?" The Fire Lord asked awkwardly, trying to avoid even hinting at what he was thinking.

"No I don't, I don't think she has one. I mean obviously she does but I don't think he's around." Zuko sighed in relief, although part of him was unspeakably angry that some jerk had apparently knocked up his little sister roughly five years ago then didn't have the decency to stick around.

Once that was out of the way Zuko found himself still annoyed, because somehow Sokka knew all this about his sister and never bothered to contact him despite knowing how worried he had been all these years.

"So how did you find all this out?" He asked and then Sokka proceeded to tell him the whole story, starting with their meeting at the bar and ending with today's battle. Zuko listened carefully to the story, and gritted his teeth when Sokka told him he believed Azula and Mika had spent at least a few months in a homeless shelter.

"I wanted to send a message here at first, I really did. But Toph told me to consider the fact that maybe Azula didn't want to be found and considering she gave me a fake name, I think she was right." Sokka finished and Zuko nodded.

"So, are you and Azula… friends?" He asked but Sokka only shrugged.

"Honestly I don't know. At first I was just trying to apologize for judging her and when I didn't hear from her I thought she was either still mad or just didn't want anything to do with me. When I stopped the mugger I didn't even know it was her until I got closer, then she just showed up at my place asking me to watch Mika for a few days. All I know now is she's changed and I know how hard that was for you, I just didn't want to see her throw it all away." He admitted and Zuko couldn't help but smile.

"Thank you" he said.

Azula groaned as she opened her eyes, and nearly panicked when that action revealed she was in a strange room. She allowed her eyes a minute or two to adjust to the darkness before she got up, although a shooting pain in her side was telling her that would be a bad idea. Once her eyes adjusted she realized that the strange room actually wasn't so strange, she was back in her old room at the palace. She groaned upon that realization, her past had officially come back to haunt her, and she didn't know if she was ready to face it.