Sorry this took so long. What's my excuse? Work? Uni? I wish. Breaking Bad started up again and that unfortunately took over my brain for two months. SO GOOD.
But it's (almost) over now, so things will go back to normal in my head. With luck.
"No!" Jin screamed as her tight grasp on Zuko's hand was wrenched away. She tried to follow him, fight her way through the crowd, but the press of bodies made it impossible. She couldn't move. She couldn't breathe. Someone swung an iron bar through the air and she ducked to avoid it. As she bowed, the crowd gave another huge sway, the momentum knocking her from her feet and onto the ground.
Her breath died in her throat, heart racing in panic. Someone trod on her injured hand and she yelped in agony, struggling to get on to her knees. She was kicked in the small of the back, by the steel-capped boot of a soldier. Jin howled, flung face-down on the ground, pain crackling up her spine. Who would kick a girl when they were already down? She knew she had to get back on her feet soon, before she was trampled underfoot and crushed. But she couldn't bend. Earth-bending towards or even around a Fire Nation soldier carried a death penalty. No one had been brave enough to try it yet. But Jin had the cold feeling that it would change after tonight. What brought this on? Finally getting on to her knees, Jin reached blindly for the nearest arm to pull herself up. She wavered on her feet for a moment, unsteady. Someone crashed into her and she almost fell, but this time, she pushed back. She wasn't going to go down again. Someone screamed near her, right in her ear. Jin screwed her eyes shut, trying to block out the sights and sounds and smells. Her back and hand hurt, and she felt sick from the smoky air. Control yourself. She berated herself internally. Get out of there! What's wrong with you? Jin tried to crane her head above the crowd, getting her bearings. Where was she? She'd lost all sense of direction. Zuko was long gone. The crowd swelled again, backwards, away from the fire. They were being pushed and beaten back. She felt a sharp jerk beside her as someone fell, trying desperately to catch her sleeve and save themselves. She managed to close her fingers around a thin, bony wrist, and heaved. She looped her arm around a skinny waist, trying to keep her injured hand free as she tugged the figure back to their feet. Jin caught a flash of white and red – the thin, terrified face of a boy no older than thirteen, the left side caked with blood. Her stomach turned, but she didn't let go. The boy struggled to stay on his feet.
"Stay with me." She commanded, shouting in his ear. Did he even hear her? The screaming and crying of the crowd was almost deafening, and always, in the back, was the deep roar of the fire. There was another jolt, as they were pushed back again. They were being herded. Her good arm around the boy's waist, she struggled her way through the crowd, consistently swaying and heaving. The soldiers were gone from the thick of the mob. She was sure the crowd was getting tighter. What's happening? Jin forced her way through the crowd, kicking and struggling for every inch of ground. The crowd grew even tighter, the boy was forced off his feet, and Jin had to essentially carry him through the thick, squashed crowd. She was able to see the street. She kicked out and elbowed her way through, and finally, sucked in a deep lungful of air as her knees hit the ground. The boy sank down beside her, coughing violently, his bony frame wracked with spasms. It was eerily silent. Jin finally looked up from the ground, terror rising in her chest as she realised why the crowd grew so silent, so tightly-packed.
Reinforcements.
They formed three heavy rows, standing shoulder to shoulder. There were ten feet between the mob and the soldiers. Jin stood up quickly, hauling the boy to his feet as she stepped backwards, trying to melt back into the crowd. But they were too tight, she couldn't get back in. Nobody wanted to be in the front.
"Drop your weapons!" One of the soldiers stepped forward. These men all carried large round shields, and long, heavy-looking clubs, perfect for cracking riotous civilians over the head and bringing them down. They'ere going to break us apart. "Down on your knees with your hands on your head!"
"Never!" Someone shouted in retaliation. The bloodied boy clung to Jin's hand, hiding behind her. She could hear him whispering and sobbing into the back of her neck. She tried to whisper that it was be all right, but her voice was lost in the night. "We'll never kneel to you!" The crowd heaved forward in a shout, Jin stumbling forward, almost falling.
"How did this happen?" She shouted in the ear of the man next to her. He sported a black eye and dried blood on his collar. He'd clearly been here for a while. "What started this?"
"They're pulling down houses to build more of their damn metal buildings." He growled in her direction. "They tried to clear out a shop and the customers refused to budge. One thing led to another." He spat blood on the cobblestones. "Scum." Jin looked back at the soldiers, heart hammering madly. The fear was winning again. She couldn't tear her eyes away from those horrible clubs and shields. No doubt they were planning on some sort of backlash. They would probably use it as justification for even harsher laws.
"We should just listen to them." Jin's voice rose in terror, growing higher and pitch. "We can't beat them when they're armed, we can't win-"
"Oh, it 'aint about winning." He cricked his neck. He held a long machete in his hands. Contraband. Behind her, the boy moaned, fingers digging into her palm. Jin realised she couldn't leave the crowd. She couldn't leave him. How could she walk away, let them be beaten and arrested and killed? But what can I do to save them? How was it her responsibility? Most of them were probably older than her. At least three quarters were male. They were all stronger, no doubt. What did she have that was special?
You know the answer to that. Her stomach lurched. Jin looked along the row, biting her lip. It was quite likely she was the only one in the riot who could bend. All the elder people she knew talked about how there weren't as many as there used to be, it was getting segregated, bred into the upper classes. Almost every bender in Ba Sing Se was conscripted into the army. As the numbers grew thinner and the situation more desperate they even talked about making allowances for females, in the past year. It was why Jin and her family kept quiet. Having three children with the gift was a rare blessing. Her father thought it was a curse. She looked back at the crowd, feeling sick with anxiety. Surely they wouldn't execute a sixteen-year-old girl. The twinge of pain in the small of her back suggested otherwise, however.
"This is your last warning!" The soldier's voice rang out, cold and clear in the night. Jin shivered. "Drop your weapons or we will be compelled to use force!"
"Come and get it!" The man beside Jin shouted back, his machete catching a orange glint of fire. No what are you doing? Her eyes darted from side to side again, heart pounding violently in her mouth. You're going to die!
Stop this! She wasn't shouting at them, this time. She shouted at herself. Did she say it aloud, or in her mind? Jin didn't know. She couldn't hear anything distinctly. The screaming and the shouts and the roaring fire became nothing but a rushing in her ears. She had seconds at the most. Her hands trembled as she kicked off her shoes, and she tried so hard to still them. It would only work if she had steady hands. She could only try it once. She pulled herself free from the crying boy behind her, taking two small steps forward. The eyes of the mob, of the soldiers, fell on her. They all froze. Jin blinked back tears, keeping her stance low and bare feet spread apart, rooting herself into the earth as she slowly spread her arms. Comprehension dawned on several faces. She heard one of the soldiers shout. Her arms were stretched outwards, shoulder blades pushed together, joints creaking at the strain. The commander took a step forward, pointing at her. Then, she lowered her arms quickly, shoulders and head bowed.
The earth cracked open.
It wasn't much of a chasm. Jin had no grand illusions about her skill. It was maybe six or seven feet deep, easy enough for a limber man to climb out of. It was wide enough to jump over. It didn't stretch entirely across the street, cutting the soldiers off completely from the riot. But it was enough. It engulfed the first row of soldiers, who tumbled down headfirst with an inelegant cry, left them scrabbling to get out, shouting and swearing, with cries to get her. The crowd rose into a loud, appreciative roar, dissolving into cackling laughter as they watched the soldier's clumsy attempts to pull themselves out of the chasm. Jin even let out a short, nervous chuckle, cut short by a rough jerk to her upper arm, pulling her back.
"You might want to get away." It was the man who stood beside her, cocking his head in the direction of the commander. He had managed to clumsily get up, and he was screaming in her direction. "Go." He pushed her backwards, into the crowd. She couldn't stop the warring; they were all too far gone. They were intoxicated with the spirit of rebellion. All she could do, all she could have done, was try and delay the fight, give the edge to the rioting civilians. Jin was ready to fight her way back in, but this time, the mob opened up for her, someone pulled her in, shouting in her ear to go this way. As she started to run, the crowd surged forward, in one final push, bearing down on the soldiers who were still trying to right themselves. Jin pushed herself through, barefoot, ducking and dodging. Her hand still hurt. She was about twenty feet through the crowd, when she realised that she'd left the boy behind. It was like receiving a heavy blow. Jin stood in the middle of the turmoil, still and silent as the horror grew in the pit of her stomach. He was in the front row. If he didn't run away himself, he would have been beaten down and trampled underfoot. Jin turned back, took several steps before her feet stilled. She couldn't go back. They knew her face. They would be after the barefoot girl with brown hair who tried to make a joke of them. Who broke one of their most important decrees. Tears streamed down her face, sobs threatening to break through her tightly pursed lips.
She'd done the wrong thing.
Please be okay. Jin realised, with another blow, that she didn't even know his name. She couldn't remember what his face really looked like. Just that it had blood on it and his arms were so thin and when she held him around the middle, she could feel his ribs. He was nameless, faceless to her. The thought didn't reassure her. It made her cry harder. She fought through the crowd blindly, kicking and screaming and throwing the odd punch. She was suffocating. She had to get out. Someone tried to grab at her. Her hair ribbon came away in their fingers. Jin couldn't breathe in the smoky, stale air. She couldn't hide her sobs anymore; they tore violently from her throat. After what seemed like an eternity of struggling, of a slow, painful suffocation, she managed to break through into the night, swallowing lungfuls of cold air, stretching her arms out before her unimpeded. She still ran, wanting to get as far away as she could from the smoke and screaming. Her vision blurred with tears, and she didn't know where she was anymore. Finally, when the stitch in her side and burning in her lungs was too much to bear, when she couldn't breathe anymore and her feet ached, Jin stopped. She reached out blindly, finding the wall, and leaned against it, slowly sinking down to the ground.
She didn't feel like a hero.
She felt like a murderer.
She couldn't even save the life of one child. She'd forgotten about him, in her own selfish, blind panic. She was too concerned with protecting herself, getting out unscathed, that she left behind an injured, defenceless child. What had she really offered? A semi-impressive display of bending that managed to slow the soldiers down for a few seconds. She didn't fight them off. A real hero, Zuko, would have stayed, would have fought to the end, while there was still a chance. Jin's head sank into her hands, dirty fingers covering her eyes. She could still smell the smoke, in the air or on her clothes, she didn't know. All she could see was the bloodied, thin little face, staring at her, desperate and pleading. Jin shook her head violently, trying to banish the image from her mind.
But it wouldn't move. She dug her fingers in and screamed, but nothing could shake the childlike brown eyes that bore down into her soul.
"Wake up... Wake up... Spirits please wake up."
There was water on his face.
It dripped on his good cheek, three soft little patters, as light as rain, rolling down his face and trickling along the juncture of his neck. His face was turned, the exposed cheek flushed in the heat. His eyes were closed, but it wasn't a blackness he saw. It was a bright, burning red, glaring behind his sealed lids. Zuko's throat rattled in a groan.
"Come on..." Someone shook his shoulder. His injured shoulder. Zuko let out a short, choked cry, jerking under the trembling hand, eyes snapped open. The orange glow burst to life. The smoke stung his eyes. Zuko buried his face into the ground and gritted his teeth, whimpering against the pain. He felt so weak, curled into the ground with what he knew was a broken limb, while the fire burned just a few feet from his face. "Please."
Zuko leaned heavily on his good arm, forcing himself to sit up. He lifted his head, catching a glimpse of the wide-eyed, crying young woman as she clung to the bundle of cloth. Zuko bowed his head in a long, low groan, clinging to his shoulder. Ying bent down, her face very close to his. She fought back sobs.
"Please, we have to go now..." She was too terrified to speak any more. Zuko arched his neck, looking up at her. He nodded, silently, getting on to his knees.
"I can't carry you." He looked at the fire. Whatever precious time Zuko had gleaned, it had slipped though his fingers. "You'll have to crawl." She gave a single, choked sob, breaking into a hiccup. Ying nodded, a shaking hand cradling the back of Hope's head. How long had he been out? Surely she wouldn't let him remain unconscious for more than a few seconds. If she was smart, she would have taken her baby and fled. Most wouldn't think twice about leaving him to die. Zuko crawled onto his hand and knees, leaning heavily on the wall as he rose to his feet. "Stay with me." Zuko made his way gingerly down the last few stairs, the wooden planks sagging under his weight. The staircase was unstable at the best of times, and the support beams were no doubt charred and smouldering. They were lucky the wood was able to hold their weight. Every nerve, every fibre of Zuko's body was on edge. He tried to stay in tune with the fire, tried to feel it within him. Anything that would give him more control.
Ying was coughing violently. Zuko tried to tell her to keep down, to suck in the previous few inches of air between the smoky haze and the floor, but she couldn't hear him through the crackling flames. He walked in front of her, kicking aside flaming pieces of furniture, forcing the fire down to smouldering embers before him. Even though his own internal fire was blocked, Zuko had a keen understanding of the flames around him. They bowed to his hand. He was unafraid. Zuko whirled around, arching his neck to examine the sagging ceiling. The support beams were as brittle as matchsticks, charred nearly through entirely. He looked back at the stairs. They'd barely walked a few feet. It wasn't fast enough.
"Get up." He bent down, taking Ying by the elbow. His heart started pounding again, in urgency and a strong undercurrent of fear. She looked up at him, pale and soot-stained. "The ceiling is going to cave in any moment. We have to run."
"I-I can't..." Ying shook her head, hair falling in her eyes.
"Yes, you can." He crouched on the floorboards, so keenly aware of the fire and heat around them. How could she argue in the middle of this? Her hands were blistered from touching something hot. How could she not feel the burning skin on her fingers? "I can't carry you Ying, my arm is broken. If you don't run, the roof will fall and you will die in here. You understand me?" Fresh tears started leaking out of her eyes, her lips formed a tiny 'o', twisting into wordless shapes as she resisted the overwhelming impulse to break down entirely. Hope gave a soft cry, pressed into her mothers' chest. Something snapped in Ying at the sound. The silent, incoherent gaping closed into a firm, straight line. She pushed her hair back, hoisting the infant, cradling it against her with one arm. With the other, she grasped Zuko's wrist, allowing herself to be hauled to her feet. She gasped, staggering and heavily leaning against him as her stomach flared up in pain. Zuko gulped at the black stain on her dress. He had seen enough blood and gore before, and it wasn't often a wound turned his stomach. But to see it on a civilian, a woman, a mother, struggling to hold her baby, left him sick. There was no answer the soldiers could give that would justify this depravity.
"Come on." He turned away, keeping his hold on her, as he picked up the pace. Ying lurched along behind, panting weakly, struggling to breathe in the smoky air. Hope was silent, her tiny limbs lax. Her complicit silence heightened Ying's fear, the young mother terrified that Hope was slowly dying, suffocated in the smoke. She didn't seem to notice that the fire didn't touch them, that it was all dying embers and tiny flames the size of candlefire around their feet. Zuko hoped that she didn't notice. Ying coughed violently, doubling over, and Zuko wound his good arm around her, pulling her in. She clung to him, trembling, her blistered skin plastered with sweat and soot and tears. How could be so calm? How could he keep himself so straight-backed and impassive in the fire? Wasn't he afraid? She couldn't breathe, she struggled to move her legs fast enough to keep up with him. He was pulling her, dragging her along while she staggered weakly, shouting in her ear that it wasn't far, she didn't have long to go, she just had to hold on for a few moments more. Finally, Zuko reached the back of the house. The door was locked, flames heaving around them, reaching a crescendo. Two floors above them, he heard long, shuddering crash. The roof had collapsed entirely. No. He let Ying go, to throw his weight against the locked door, feeling the softened metal break under the heat and pressure. He staggered forward into the night, a momentary breath of air on his face, another terrific crash resounding through the burning house. Ying was on her hands and knees in the doorway, struggling to crawl with one arm. The flames heaved. Zuko screamed, his voice swallowed up in the roaring fire, and threw himself on top of the woman, as the charred, vestigial remains of broken foundations crumbled entirely, the weight of two floors and a ceiling crashing down to the ground. Zuko held on to her, screaming in her ear to stay low and keep small and still, summoning every ounce of will, of strength, to keep the heat and the fire at bay. This wasn't as direct, as explosive, as the attack that had destroyed his ship, but he didn't have his own fire to protect himself this time. He couldn't curl himself up. The fire rose in one final gasp of air, smoke and flames billowing from the broken windows, the naked roof, the open door where Zuko crouched. He could smell burning hair. He didn't even know if he was doing anything to hold the fire back anymore. He couldn't feel or hear anything, just an enormous rush, cascading through his limbs, breaking apart in his mind. What if he was burning? How long had this lasted? Seconds? Minutes?
Ying closed her eyes, screaming, holding Hope close to her, wondering if there was any way she could end it quickly for the child, before they started burning. But they weren't burning. She pressed her forehead into the ground, where the stone floor crossed over to the outside world, struggling to breathe. How was she still alive? Was the doorway protecting her? Had something fallen against it, somehow bracing them against the worst of it? Ying tried to see through the eye-watering smoke, but couldn't make anything out, just a dull orange glow in the midst of the grey. Then, he rolled her onto her back, touching her face, seeing if she was still alive. Ying couldn't speak. How could this happen? How could they both be so removed from the fire that had entirely devastated everything around them? How had it not destroyed all three of them? What had the boy done? How did he manage to fight back the flames?
"Come on." He scooped her up with one arm, and she leaned against him. They half-walked, half-staggered, both exhausted and in pain. Zuko carried her as far as he could, outside, along the back alley, before slumping down, leaning her against a cool brick wall. Ying sucked in repeated gasps of sweet night air, lungs burning as she struggled to breathe through her sobs. "Calm down. You're all right." Zuko wiped at her face with his sleeve, aching for her. Thank Agni she was alive. He didn't know what he would have done if she had died. He would have completely lost his mind. She herself had retreated inward in her terror, absorbed in the shock and horror of what almost killed her. "It's okay." He said again, crouching down in front of her, taking her shoulders. She was starting to hyperventilate, trembling flingers tightening around the rustling figure of her infant daughter. "Look at me." He was so close to her. Ying opened her eyes once more, his face light up brilliantly in the distant glow. She was able to truly see him for the first time, really look at him properly without the smoke and fire obscuring her vision, burning her eyes. She caught his scar, still plainly visible through the dust and soot, an impression of the deathly white skin beneath, and his eyes. They were the same colour as the fire. It was a face she had seen before. Ying's throat closed in horror, and realisation, as the pieces fell together, and she slowly recognized the face so close to her, the face she had seen on paper, dozens, hundreds of times before. Something must have shown in her own face, something that suggested awful realisation, because he looked away, eyes lowering. "You know who I am." Ying nodded silently. He caught the movement in the corner of his eye.
"P-P-Pri-" She couldn't speak. Zuko pressed a finger in her lips, locking his gaze with her again as she fell silent. He shook his head, desperately, begging her to keep the name locked behind her lips. Zuko looked her up and down, giving the woman a last once-over. She was stricken and had a burn on her arm but she lived. The baby in her arms was making soft, murmuring sounds. They lived through the fire. Because of him. Nobody else in the city could have done anything to save them. Not of their own volition. Zuko retreated, standing up slowly, backing away. Ying got up on her knees, realising that he was going to leave her.
"I won't tell." Her voice cracked, it was plaintive and tiny, Zuko was already walking backwards, away from the riot and the fire and into the darkness that stretched out before him in the narrow alley. But he heard her. "P-Please-" Ying pitched forward, struggling to stand. She could hear footsteps, coming from the other direction. People had seen her, they rushed over from the dying remains of the burned house. Someone took her baby away, and she let them, her limbs heavy and dead. Someone else draped a blanket over her shoulders, murmuring something in her ear, soothing, garbled words that were completely alien to her. Someone else again, lifted her up from the ground. Ying stretched out her arm towards the darkness, where he had vanished, eyes filling with fresh tears. Someone thought she was asking for water, and they pressed a water skin to her slack lips. It spilled over her chin, and she pushed it away, trembling. Did no one else see him? She stared beyond them all, into the darkness, where she saw him run away, swallowed up in the night.
But she couldn't see anything, not even a shadow of the figure who had saved her life, the face she had seen before on wanted posters that stretched beyond the sands of the desert, to the province of her destroyed hometown, who left because he knew that being caught would seal his death. A single instance of heroism, no matter how dramatic, wouldn't begin to clear his name. She struggled on the edge of consciousness, one single thread keeping her eyes open as she tried to comprehend what had happened, her rescue at the hands of a hated enemy, the very heir of the race which had destroyed almost everything she'd held dear to her. It hurt her head to think about it. She couldn't understand. Her eyes slowly drifted closed, weighed down with lifeless exhaustion. Now the heart-stopping terror was over, her life was preserved, Ying felt hollow, thin and fragile as glass. Her home was gone. She didn't know where her husband was. If he was alive. She didn't know if people were still rioting. But she didn't care about any of it. As selfish as it was of her, Ying couldn't spare a thought towards any of it. The thread was starting to unravel. The garbled words in her ear grew thicker, indistinct. She let herself succumb to the sweet darkness, murmuring Zuko's name, silently, on her lips.
"Where are we going?"
Mai's heart pounded as she walked carefully through the darkness, the single lantern from her hand throwing ominous, angular shadows around the low-ceilinged passageway. Jet's hand was clenched tightly around her fingers. He walked so close to her. She could hear his breath, in and out, in that awful, broken breathing of his. He asked the question again, his voice low. She turned her head to look at him, his face half-lit by the lantern, eyes wide beneath his shock of brown hair. Mai looked away, down the hall.
"Outside." She finally spoke up after a few minutes of silence. "We're going outside." It was stupidly risky of her. If she were caught, she would have to explain herself to the commander of the ship. And Azula. She would have to justify herself to her. She might not see it the way Mai did. She might think the girl was planning some sort of escape.
Don't be ridiculous. She trusts you completely.
"Why?" He was looking at her again. Mai turned her gaze to meet him. He looked so curious, so confused. She shifted the lantern in her hand, guiding him around a corner.
"Because you need some air." Maybe it would jog something, deep down in the hidden recesses of his memory. Mai wasn't hopeful. But it was worth a chance. At least she could tell Azula she had exhausted every possible opportunity before she told her that the rebel she'd captured had no surviving memory of his own crimes.
Besides, she hated the thought of him being locked away in that cell. It was a dark, stuffy coffin. She couldn't stand being there for more than a few minutes. She'd always feel claustrophobic. It was the high ceilings and chambers she'd grown up in, the sense of space, being in the middle of a crowd, locked away internally, looking around at the world around her, that made it feel cold and unnatural. Even though she was introverted and restrained, Mai didn't like being in small, enclosed spaces. When other people were around, she had something to watch, to listen, to think about. When she was alone, Mai had only the voices in her head to comfort her. When she had to be alone, she tried entertaining herself with books or small games, but everything eventually fell idle from her hands and she was left locked inside her head.
The wheel of the door turned under her hands, whispering softly in the dark. Jet was watching her anxiously, at her side. She wondered what he was expecting. Hopefully it wouldn't be too cold for him, in those ragged grey clothes that barely covered his skinny limbs. Contrition stabbed at her heart. How could she not think to consider it? She was warm, in long clothes underneath a heavy robe, and he already shivered in the stale air. But something in her mind told her that it wouldn't matter. Not all that much.
Jet's breath seized in his throat as he stepped outside into the ocean air. For the first time in his memory, he felt the wind on his face, through his hair. He breathed in deeply. The air was fresh, cold, with an edge that he couldn't identify. It was the salt spray. Mai had to push him gently across the deck, guiding him to the railing. His knuckles were white as he grasped the iron bar, leaning forward, breathing in deeply with closed eyes. His lungs burned from the air. It was so completely unlike his cell. It was unbelievable. The wind was bitingly cold, but he didn't feel the goosebumps breaking out along his skin. Mai watched as he arched his neck backwards, face turned up to the sky. It was so strange to her, to watch such a simple, childish enjoyment in plain fresh air. His chest groaned and cracked with every intake of breath, but Jet couldn't stop inhaling deep lungfuls of the night air. It was intoxicating. He felt dizzy. He pitched forward, looking for a moment as though he was about to fall.
"Watch out." Mai took him by the hand, gently guiding him back from over the railing. Jet's eyes snapped open, meeting hers in the grey half-light. Her hand tightened on his arm as she realised he was shivering. She shrugged out of her heavy outer robe, taking his other hand off the railing and gently draping the garment over his shoulders.
"I'm not cold." Jet protested quietly. But he accepted the offering, turning to her, staring at her with those penetrating eyes. Mai's loose hair fell across her face. As she reached to peel it away, Jet took her hand, wrapping his thin fingers around her palm. Her breath died in her throat. He pushed it out of her eyes himself, trying to tuck the loose strands behind her ear. His fingers brushed the juncture of her neck, the boy not breaking his gaze for a moment. Mai's lip quivered. She felt as though she was leaning too far over the railing, with the dark, turbulent waters below, ready to claim her. What are you going stop this right now Mai don't you even dare-
She closed her eyes as he kissed her. Perhaps, if she didn't see it, she could pretend that it was a surprise, that she didn't expect it to happen. The thrill that rose in her stomach, an electric shock that crackled down her spine. His fingers were crushing her hand. Mai grabbed the front of his clothes, intending to push him away. But something within her, something carnal and hot, pulled him closer. She could feel his hands, so chillingly cold, on her throat, the back of her neck, sliding down.
No!
Mai's chest heaved as she pulled away from him, arching her neck backwards, into the night, taking in ragged, broken gasps of air as she struggled to breathe. She stepped back, turning away from Jet, with her fingers over her lips. His hands slipped away, useless and lax. Her mind was whirling. She felt numb. He was watching her, silently, his own cold hands shaking as guilt and shame sent his heart racing and face red. He thought he'd read her, thought that her wide eyes and soft words, and her kindness, were some sort of expression of affection. He thought she was trying to get close to him. The seconds stretched between them, long, oppressing, and stiflingly dark.
"Mian, I-"
"You need to go back." She cut over him. She didn't want to hear his voice, his justification, for what he had done. Her own pallid cheeks were flushed. She took the lantern, holding it down, keeping her face in shadow. She didn't want him to look at her. She was terrified there was something in her face that would give something away. She was always proud of her mask, her perfectly-honed ability to assume an air of sardonic indifference, but this shook her, terribly. She couldn't trust her face to keep her secrets. She took him by the wrist, pulled him roughly. His frail, broken body followed obediently, Jet turning back, catching one last glimpse of the stars, the heaving ocean, stretching on and on, forever, before she pulled him inside and shut the door. The air was immediately warm, damp, and stifling. The lantern which just moments before was a tiny spark, a match-flame in the deep nothingness, lit the grey walls, turned them orange. They pressed in on Jet. He was being crushed. And still she pulled him on, her feet thudding on the metal ground, heavy and dull, his own stumbling, bare-foot tread echoing hers. She wouldn't look in his direction. She kept a pace ahead of him, looking more like a shadow to him, the deeper they descended into the ship. Mai walked faster, almost running down the hall. She was dragging Jet at this point, and he struggled to keep up as he started to gasp. His chest hurt, terribly. He tried to pant out a panicked plea for her to stop, but the noise couldn't pass his lips. She was terrified of running into any guards. There would be no way for her to disguise this. Azula would want to know what she was up to. Why she was taking these risks? She wouldn't be allowed to see him anymore. Something pulled at her, deep in her heart, at the thought. It made her sick. She wanted to stay with him.
He was like a child, with his naivety, his complete lack of worldly understanding. All he knew, was what she told him. It was a completely blank slate. It was how she looked. Empty. No, not empty. Jet had his own secrets, underneath. They were locked away, forbidden. No living soul could touch them, not even himself. He had his own facade, just like her. Only his wasn't intentional. The person he was, that was scrubbed out, almost entirely, leaving only a faint reminder of what once lived. No memories, just hearsay and fragments of rumour. While her empty facade was an act, his was genuine. She was trying to draw out the person that lingered inside, but the longer she tried, the more time she spend with him, Mai slowly realised that there was no way to retrieve him. He was locked away, in the bottom of a very, very deep pit, with no way to drag him out. Perhaps he was dead entirely.
And she liked that. The idea of losing one's past, entirely, having everything that made them human, that made them them, scourged from the body and soul, both terrified and seduced her. She could pretend to be as blank and clean as a piece of paper, but she couldn't hide the stains on her soul. It was black and decaying. Mai had no delusions about her crimes. She was far from innocent. No amount of scrubbing could remove the hurt she had caused. Every passing day, as she remained complicit in Azula's hand, the stain grew bigger, the stark realisation that she was doing wrong, she knew it, and no amount of rationalisation could ever change the truth, it grew.
But she didn't want to be clean. She didn't want to be the innocent child that Jet was. She could never bear to part with her past. It was like running away, leaving somebody else behind, to be framed, like Jet. Innocent and guilty all at once, destined to die for what the past Jet had done. That shadowy former self, locked in the bottom of that pit with no way of getting out.
Jet heard the sounds of voices, of footsteps, before she did. He stopped short on his walk, staggering forward as Mai pulled on his arm, still caught up in her own thoughts, not realising that he had stopped until she felt the uncomfortable jerk on her shoulder.
"What is it?" She couldn't see Jet's face. The lamp didn't light it. She'd kept it low in her hand on purpose.
"Listen." He said simply. They were well within earshot now. Mai's eyes grew wide, slowly filling with horror. No. They weren't coming from outside. They were emerging from the depths of the ship. Where she needed to be.
"Come on." She hissed, finding the first door at her right. She pulled it open, shoving him inside. She hovered in the doorway for a moment, indecisive, before stepping inside and letting the door shut, quietly. She leaned against the steel with a long sigh, closing her eyes.
"Mian?" Her eyes snapped open. Mai realised for the first time that Jet was breathing very, very close to her. He was so close. The blood rushed to her face, as she realised they were in a tiny closet. One foot was in a bucket, the other standing on a mop. She couldn't speak. He grasped at her hand, the one that held the little lantern, prising it from her fingers, lifting it slowly. Bringing the light up to their eyes. "Mian, I-"
"Shh." She held a finger to her lips. The footsteps were close. She strained to hear what they were saying, but it was garbled and fuzzy. They were most likely soldiers, out to take their turn on patrol. They wore such heavy boots. Jet fell silent, but he kept looking at her, with that fixed, inscrutable gaze. Mai looked down at her feet, resolutely. It was a battle of wills. She wouldn't look at him. Because she was terrified something would give her away. She felt brittle under his gaze. Like single crack in a glass, that threaded outwards, spreading, like a web, about to shatter, the second it was touched.
Her eyes flickered upward. Mai couldn't bear looking down anymore, couldn't handle the weight of Jet's eyes on her. So she lifted her head and looked in the eye. She was going to challenge him. To show that he had no effect on her. But the moment she looked at him, deep down, beyond his dark eyes, a short, ugly half-gasp, almost like a sob, broke from her lips. Her hands were shaking. She felt sick in her chest. Mai hadn't felt something like this since Zuko. This was dangerous and electrifying. Zuko was an idea she had grown up with, something that had shifted abruptly from a certainty to an illicit doubt. But this, with Jet, had never been right.
Was that why her heart beat so fast in her throat? Was it the idea that compelled her? Was that why she found herself inching closer to him, unable to tear herself away from those unwavering dark eyes? Was that why her hands were on his face?
Mai was relieved when Jet let the lantern slip from his hands. The glass broke, the little light went out, the pair were plunged instantly into a crushing, immutable blackness. She couldn't see anything, not even a shadow, not even the faintest blur in the dark. She could only hear, and smell and touch and taste. She could almost imagine somebody else. No, she couldn't. The voice was too different.
Later in bed, she would close her eyes and open them again, looking up at the ceiling, lit vaguely by the golden crack of light under the door. She tried to imagine what it must have looked like. Because without sight it felt to her a dream. Unreal and remote. It was already slipping away from her, somehow.
But facing his own low ceiling in the lamplight, Jet kept his eyes closed, keeping the smell and sound of her on the edge of his senses. Those few moments in the blackness were the most vivid of his life.
"Go to bed Shan."
There was a half-darned sock lying abandoned in her lap. A cup of tea rested on the arm of her chair, cold. Her face was white and pinched, dark brown eyes staring down at her trembling fingers. She ignored her husbands' words. She clenched her hands, loosened her fingers, balled them into fists, again and again, watching her knuckles flash white. Dark smudges, black as coal, were under her eyes. Renshu pressed a thumb against the page of his book, the spine creaking in the dimly-lit room as he lay it closed on his lap. She heard the noise, her face brittle and strained. "I'll stay up. You get some sleep." She was as stiff and deaf as stone. He couldn't look at her face. She was positively haunted. Renshu closed his eyes, heaving a long sigh. "Do you want something to drink?"
He didn't mean another cup of tea. He thought at first that Shan was ignoring him. But she gave the slightest, almost imperceptible shake of her head, eyes still staring downwards as she wrung her hands. "Are you hungry?" Another shake. It wasn't as though Renshu had the slightest idea of how to cook. She took care of all that. "He'll be back soon." He tried to keep his tone warm. She didn't make any outward sign of comprehension. "He's a clever boy, he'll keep out of trouble." He tried to console her. It wasn't working. Her concern left him aching. It wasn't even her son, but she wouldn't sleep until he came home. She exhausted herself with fear and worry. As far as Shan was concerned, Lee was her boy, as long as he lived under this roof. She'd stepped into those empty shoes, because she didn't think he had anybody else. Renshu let out a long, deep sigh, leaning back into the chair, the spine creaking once more as he opened the book, turning his eyes back to the page. She was still and quiet, she had shut herself off from him. There was nothing more he could say. Nothing he could do, other than wait, with her, in the light of a single candle at his elbow, which slowly descended into the wax, the light growing dimmer, the shadows lengthening.
He started to grow sleepy. He'd slept badly the past week, kept awake with that all-too-familiar feeling of unease and restlessness, Shan tossing and turning beside him. They whispered to each other in the night, Shan holding his hand, like she used to when she was just a girl. Asking him if it was going to be okay. He couldn't give her an honest answer.
The book was heavy and wordy, he found himself rereading sentences, struggling to take it all in. His eyes stung. Every time he turned a page, the bandage on his wrist rustled against the paper, dragging him out of his torpor as rage and injustice swelled afresh within him. Eventually he let the book fall closed in his lap, leaning back against the chair as his eyes drifted closed. He cast a sidelong glance at his wife before his eyelids lowered, catching a glimpse of her in that same stiff position, with her hands and eyes locked.
He was almost asleep when he heard the doorlatch click.
Shan jerked up, knocking the tea cup from the chair as she started, rising instinctively to her feet. She didn't rush to the door right away. She stood there, her mouth in a twisted, trembling knot as she stared at the closed door. Renshu sat motionless. They'd locked the door before. Security measures. Shan let out a choked gasp in realisation, scurrying across the room, her fingers trembling as she slid the lock, heaving the door open.
"Where have you been?" She was near tears. Renshu set the book aside, standing up slowly as Shan pulled the dark-headed boy into the room, slamming the door shut, driving the bolt home. "It's almost dawn, you've been gone all night!" She tried to keep her voice low, for her children's sake. They didn't need to hear this. But her whispered voice broke into a high, rasping screech. She shook Lee by the shoulders as she shouted in his face. "Jin's been worried sick about you! She said there was a riot, and-"
"Shan, stop." She froze at the hand on her arm. His voice was so soft, next to hers. It was why she stopped, so suddenly. Renshu's stomach clenched painfully as he looked at the teenager. He smelled of smoke, his clothes were covered in soot and singed at the hem, ash smudged his face. But that wasn't what rattled Renshu. Lee looked petrified, stunned, and absolutely devastated. His face was as white as paper beneath the soot and ash, his chin tight and eyes oddly bright, with that familiar, tense expression of a young man who was doing everything in his power to keep from crying. "Lee, what's wrong?" Shan's voice was a broken whimper in her throat as she finally looked at him, finally realised how broken down and frayed he had become.
"Lee?" She tried asking him herself, her hands relaxing on his shoulders, hanging loosely, suggestive of an embrace. He made an expression of pain. Shan mistook it for some sort of emotional turmoil. "Lee, talk to us."
"I..." He shook his head, a hand over his mouth. He stepped away from her, refusing to look at either of them.
"Sit." Renshu took his singed sleeve, guiding him to the chair. He sat down heavily, looking down at his trembling, soot-stained hands. He could still hear the screaming. The smell of the smoke. The blood. "Jin said there was a riot. Are you all right?"
"I.." He still couldn't talk. Zuko could still hear that soft little babies' whimper, in the cold, dark alley, stirring her weak limbs. They were so close to death. "I-I'm fine." He managed to choke out, fooling nobody.
"What happened?" Shan was persistent. She ignored the scathing look from her husband, crouching down beside the chair. The boy couldn't look either of them. His head was now in his hands, in an attempt to hide from the pair. "Lee?"
"There was..." He swallowed. "There was this house... And it was burning, they set it on fire, I don't know why..." Renshu's folded arms slowly fell to his side, listening. "This woman and her baby were stuck inside, she was pinned. Her husband, he was screaming at the soldiers to get her out and they weren't listening... They knew she was in there and she was going to die and they did nothing." Shan gasped, her lower lip trembling. Renshu's hand fell on Shan's shoulder, squeezing tightly in a weak attempt to comfort her. The woman felt sick. "They weren't part of the riot. They hadn't done anything." Zuko's voice rose higher. "We're supposed to fight with honour!" He couldn't comprehend it. Despite his growing cynicism, Zuko still had some tiny seed left of his old ideals. At the very least, he would have expected others to follow it. "How can we say we're so great, after doing this?" He stopped paying attention to what he was saying. He had forgotten himself. He was exhausted and traumatized. He was no stranger to bloodshed, but the events of the night struck a chord deep within him, breaking past his battle-hardened shell, piercing his heart. They were going to kill a baby. His voice faded to a murmur. "How could we do this?"
Renshu's heart quickened. His gaze dropped down to his wife, but he only saw that same mournful shock and sympathy. She wasn't as fast as him. He looked down the soot-stained ivory fingers, threaded through the shaggy mop of black hair. Lee was shaking his head, muttering to himself, but Renshu ceased to listen as he struggled to piece together the boys' frantic outburst.
What did he mean by 'we'?
Cue the drama.
Next one is going to have so much going on it'll make your head spin. (Now I have to live up to that)