The Sins of the Father
It looked like an abandoned ranch in the middle of nowhere, and yet Azula knew that it housed the most dangerous man in the world.
At one point, the ranch might have been a success. The main structure was obviously built to endure, since it was still standing amidst the fields of dust even decades after its last inhabitants had passed on. The remains of the fence enclosed an impressive amount of land, where pigsheep or rabbaroos or herds of ostrich horses might have grazed. But any grasses were long gone, given way to gray dirt sapped of all life-giving properties, though the ranch facilities still remained: stables, storage sheds, feeding troughs, and workshops. The whole thing did a very convincing job of impersonating a corpse, even though Azula knew that it had returned to life, and she couldn't help but relate.
Dong Min had returned life to this ghost ranch. And he was processing kidnapped women like rabbaroos raised for slaughter.
Azula rode her komodo rhino to the top of a hill overlooking the ranch, the morning sun shining behind her. The Rough Rhinos were still acting as her Honor Guard, and when Azula was satisfied with her view, she gave a nod to Colonel Mongke beside her. He used his horn to blow a resounding call that echoed over the empty flatlands. In response, a heavy chorus of discordant voices rose up from behind, a sound that was instantly drowned out by the pounding of ostrich horse feet against the dusty ground. Azula's small army rose over the hill around her and flooded towards the ranch in what she was sure was probably one of the more ridiculous sights to be found across the world at this exact point in time. It was less ridiculous when the enemy emerged from the ranch buildings to fight back.
This wasn't a declared war, a war between recognized nations, but nevertheless the enemy was kind enough to wear uniforms to this battle. Their armor wasn't dissimilar to that of a warrior in the Fire Army, but the tunics they wore beneath the metal plates were a green that recalled Avatar Kyoshi's robes. That alone was indication that Azula was in the right place; she had seen those uniforms before, in the Chubang Mountains, on Long Feng's neo-Dai Li. How many of them came from the original organization in Ba Sing Se? Some had gone missing when the White Lotus liberated the city, and others had disappeared from the Fire Nation when Azula herself- in another, long lost life- had banished them. But those lost Dai Li weren't great in number, while the force arrayed at this ranch were to stand up to her own small army.
As she watched, surrounded by the Rough Rhinos, the enemy began their defense. Upward swings of their fists tore small rocks from the ground, or perhaps just pressed the dust together into hardened clumps. Then some subtle hand tricks made the actual attack: the rocks broke apart and pieces that were too small to see from Azula's position shot forward with speed that made the air whistle. The individual pieces, however small, lost nothing to their lack of mass. They pierced through the armor of Azula's soldiers like it wasn't even there. The men fell from their ostrich horses with strangled cries.
Azula forced herself not to react. These weren't the first men to die under her command, but they were the first she had to witness giving their lives for her cause. The true Princess Azula wouldn't have been bothered by it, and that was the part that the Azula of today had to play. It helped that she, and her followers, truly believed in her cause. Long Feng's people had to be stopped or killed.
Just behind Azula, one of the Rough Rhinos spoke. "I've seen that trick before." It was Kahchi, the man with the braided beard who wielded the guan dao bladed staff. Azula turned to find him staring at the battle with disturbing intensity. "It was back before I was tagged for the Rhinos. The Earthbenders make those pebbles small so that they fly fast enough to drill through most armor. They cut through meat with no problem, and then shatter against bone. It supposedly takes a lot of strength and control, and isn't very accurate unless a bunch work together. That's why it's not more common. The ones we were fighting were an elite unit from Omashu. Those of us who came out of the battle with all our limbs still attached hunted down every last one of those Earthbenders."
Mongke shifted atop his rhino. "I heard that the Avatar used a trick like this against ol' Fire Lord Ozai on the day of Sozin's Comet. Ozai was hauled back in one piece, though, so I figured that if Kahchi here knows his stuff, then the guy I was talking to must have been exaggerating."
"Or," Azula said, "the Avatar simply missed." She didn't tell them where her insight came from, and in truth she wasn't sure. She had memories of witnessing that fight between Aang and Ozai, but Sokka's running commentary was an intrinsic part of them. Was her true experience that he simply described it to her after the fact and programmed her to think she was really there? Or had Princess Azula truly been in attendance that day, all other tales to the contrary? "Well, as valuable as it's been to see that the Dai Li have learned some new tricks, I think this has gone on long enough. Colonel Mongke, give the next signal."
Mongke took up his horn again, and blew another pattern, this one a bit more complicated. In response, a cloud of dust rose up in the distance behind the ranch and began moving forward with unnatural speed. Soon, even Azula could see the source of the filthy cloud.
It was her second army.
Her Earthbender army.
They dirt-skated forward towards the neo-Dai Li, and when the defenders turned their little stone ballistics at Azula's newest soldiers, thick stone walls rose to provide defense. Even as the high-speed pebbles chewed at the standing slabs, more earth rose to reinforce the walls and then they began grinding forward, pushed along by Earthbenders. The enemy soon realized that they were at the center of a pincer, and either needed to change tactics or change positions.
Azula didn't much care what they chose. "Rhinos, it's time to get our own mission underway."
Getting an Earthbender army hadn't been as difficult as Azula would have expected. She simply had to ask her new pet Dai Li agent, the captured administrator who had commanded Long Feng's forces in the Northeastern Colonies.
Azula liked to call him Scar, after the mark on his face.
After her army's assault on the Dai Li's estate in Geum Gwuang, Azula, Mongke, and the archer Vachir had spent all the rest of the night interrogating Scar. Azula had estimated that they would only have until dawn before people would start to wonder what was going on there, and the guards at the hole they blew in the estate's wall had already reported a scuffle with the local peacekeepers. Every minute they stayed was a risk, but Azula needed the information Scar offered, and could less afford the risk that the coward would somehow escape or kill himself to protect his knowledge. Even after they had negotiated for Dong Min's location- Scar's life in exchange exact directions to the abandoned ranch where Dong Min had set up shop- Azula had pressed on. "And what kind of defenses does Dong Min have to protect him? If I get there and find that you've led me into a trap, I'm going to be very upset."
Vachir had twisted Scar's arm behind him, and the former Dai Li agent squealed in response. "Ahh! Ah, no real defenses, but he has enough soldiers there to help manage all the... ah, all your duplicates. They can all fight."
"Hence them being soldiers," Azula had muttered, her mind already in motion. "And, even more importantly, they can probably burrow away with Dong Min if necessary. Firebenders and swords can't counter that. We need an edge. We need... Earthbenders!" Azula had smiled at the idea that just popped into her conflicted head, and made it look as feral as possible. "Tell me, did any of the rebel groups you had worshipping my imposters have Earthbenders?"
"That-" Scar had swallowed, eyes shifting back and forth between Azula and the Rough Rhinos. "That's not part of the deal."
Azula hadn't particularly wanted to torture a man for information, or even order it done, but she desperately needed what Scar knew. Doubtless, the real Princess Azula would have done so without blinking, and she didn't need the Rough Rhinos wondering why she was acting so squeamishly.
For added confusion, Azula had Suki's memories and Suki had been a prisoner of the true Princess Azula in the fictional history Sokka had crafted. Yet those memories were the vaguest in Suki's fake past. There were some of the fight where Suki and her Warriors had been captured, and then just unfocused impressions of imprisonment in the Boiling Rock until her rescue. She remembered the prison's bullying guards, but that was it. Even in Sokka's story, there was nothing to go on about Azula's actions. The other Kyoshi Warriors had been sent to another prison with less security, and none of them spoke of Azula as anything more than the one who captured them. What did that mean?
Speculation offered no answers, so Azula had shaken her head and made up a story about how Vachir could use arrowheads to extract teeth from an unwilling patient's mouth, and Scar had begun babbling all kinds of useful information about some rebel groups in the province immediately to the north where Earth Kingdom culture still enjoyed some prominence. After ransacking the rest of the mansion and quickly interviewing the other residents, Azula had led her army back to the relative safety of the lawless wilderness.
Her army, and her new prisoners. Including Scar and the newest Victim.
After meeting up with the Rough Rhino Ogodei aboard his steamship to drop off the prisoners, resupply, and make new plans, it was time for Azula to collect her Earthbenders. Her previous recruiting efforts had been haphazard, based entirely on who Azula randomly encountered on the road to Scar's hideout. This time, she could go straight to the rebel bases and deal with a show of strength. It had been a surprise when she happened on another of The Victims.
She had strolled right into the first rebel base- an artificial cave not far from a major highway- with Meisai and the Rough Rhinos in their usual positions behind her, and was surprised to find the rebels themselves gathered around a map table with one of Long Feng's duplicates in the middle of giving a briefing.
"Well, well," Azula had said. "This is awkward."
She had planned for the stroll-right-in strategy to work because she looked like the rebels' leader, but it had failed rather spectacularly. The rebels made to attack, while Meisai and the Rough Rhinos had prepared to counter-attack, but then everything had been brought to a halt by The Victim's cry of, "Wait!" She had walked forward- moving just like Mianju the Victim had, to Azula's discomfort- and gazed at Azula with clear wonder. "Who are you?"
Azula had taken a deep breath, and began improvising a new kind of sales pitch. "Clearly, I'm the true Princess Azula. You're nothing but a work of art made in appreciation of my greatness." The imposter had begun to protest, but Azula waved a puff of blue fire into the space between them, making the other woman stumble back reflexively. "If you were me, you'd be a Firebender. The greatest Firebender alive. If you were me, you would fight like someone trained since birth by the Fire Nation's greatest warriors." The imposter bumped up against the map table, trapped, and Azula added, "If you were me, Long Feng wouldn't have brainwashed you to kill yourself as soon as your situation became difficult."
The duplicate's eyes had widened at that, the fear evident in her their light, and her right hand moved to the small of her back. Before she could do anything more than pull the knife from the hidden sheath, Azula's own hand was there to grab the wrist and hold it steady. "Really, the suicide trick again?" With her left hand, Azula pulled the knife she had taken from the imposter at Scar's estate out of her belt, and held it up so that everyone could see. "I'm starting to make a collection of these knives. Too bad they're not more decorative." She yanked the imposter's arm out so that her own knife was plainly visible as being identical to Azula's, and gave a superior smile that she didn't feel at all. "Don't you have any original moves? I swear, no matter how many times I do this, it's always the same."
The Victim had panicked at that, screeching and trying to yank away, but Azula was ready, and had the other woman pinned in an instant. Meisai and the Rough Rhinos had then taken custody of her, tying her up and gagging her, while Azula turned to the gaping rebels. "As you can see, you've been the victims of a rather awful conspiracy. What did that imposter promise you, that you would follow a supposed Firebender?"
One of rebels, a tall woman in polished armor, had said, "She claimed that she wanted to destroy the nation that had cast her out, that her revenge was more important than who ran the colonies."
"Ah, revenge. Good, then we're already on the same page. I'm after revenge on those using my face to destroy the colonies and trick their people. I want to avenge myself against the rest of the world by making the colonies into a new nation that will rise above the others."
The rebel woman had frowned. "Rise how?"
Azula had reached down and picked up a rock off the floor with one hand, and then summoned a torch of azure flame in her other hand. "Rise by uniting. If everyone in the colonies comes together- equal in all things- then we'll have an advantage over all three nations. We'll have all their strengths combined, and knowledge of their weaknesses. In many colonies now, that's already a way of life, but I want to take it even further. Allowing people wearing red to profit off the labor of people in green will just be taking on the old weaknesses of the other nations. We need to create something new, something to empower all our people, instead of just a corrupt few."
And by sticking to that message, Azula had eventually brought those rebels around, once they were sure that Fire Lord Zuko wouldn't be pleased. They pledged their loyalty to her, and the Earthbenders among them freely gave of their skills. That incident was the true seed, and from that, Azula grew a new army. It was smaller than her army of Fire soldiers, and Azula made sure to keep them from intermingling to much for now, but it was an advantage she would use to get her hands on Dong Min.
Her influence was growing, and with it, the danger.
From an observation point far back from where the main battle was taking place, Meisai used her spyglass to watch Azula and the Rough Rhinos ride off towards Dong Min's ranch. "They're off. We just have to hope that they can get into the building unnoticed."
The observation point was a temporary camp staffed by just a handful of guards, and Meisai's report wasn't really necessary. There was nothing any of them could do to influence the battle at this point, and they had their own duties. One of the most important was keeping an eye on the prisoners, the two Azula-imposters who were lying unconscious and tied up on a pair of bedrolls. When they were awake the women never stopped struggling, even to the point of exhaustion, and didn't make any attempt to communicate. Sometimes, Meisai wondered if it wouldn't be a mercy to just kill them painlessly, but Azula had hopes that this 'Dong Min' would be able to fix them. Meisai wasn't so sure- all this talk of brainwashing people and molding their faces to match someone else's was completely beyond anything she had experienced- but at the very least Dong Min would have further knowledge of Long Feng's organization.
And Azula herself.
Assembling an army was one thing, but keeping it was quite another, and the sooner they brought this conflict to a close, the better. For now their money was holding out, thanks to the gold they seized from Scar's estate, and the loyalty of the troops hadn't wavered, although Meisai suspected that things would change now that the casualties were starting to pile on and Earthbenders had been added to the mix. There was no reason to delay if they could quickly move to take Long Feng out and get on to the real work of stealing his plans to make this new nation.
And even though Meisai's comment was completely useless, someone found value in it anyway. "They'll be all right," Toru- Father- said. "The Rough Rhinos put on a good show of being nothing more than landlubbing pirates, but they know their stuff when it comes to fighting and soldier movements and whatnot. They'll get her in, one way or another."
Meisai found herself nodding, because even though her father was nothing more than a sailor- even though he had made a deal with Long Feng behind her back that had led directly to the current situation- she really did believe what he said. Yes, he had tricked her. Lied to her, really. But Meisai could hear the desperation to make her troubles go away in Father's voice, and despite it all she still found she valued his judgment and experience.
Azula had formally forgiven him, so what was Meisai waiting for?
Mongke took the lead on the charge, and pointed his komodo rhino straight into the heart of the dust cloud being generated by the warring Earthbenders. Azula rode right behind, and heard him bark commands to the other Rough Rhinos. "Vachir, get a line on the ranch and keep us straight in the dust. Yeh-Lu, look for fires and shout if we drift too close. Kahchi, stay by the Princess and play babysitter!"
Kahchi steered his rhino up close to Azula's, and she wasn't unappreciative. Every battle with her army was a new experience, and riding blind into the middle of the fray was not something she knew how to deal with. But she had to be here, to make sure she didn't lose Dong Min, and so she was more than willing to accept help in staying alive.
The group passed into the cloud and the sun disappeared. The earth pulsed irregularly beneath Azula's charging rhino, and the air was filled with cries and crashes. She could barely make out the tail of Mongke's rhino, and Vachir became a shadow dancing ahead like a ghostly guide. She held on to the reins and tried to focus on staying in position, but then a shadow swiped through the haze and Azula realized too late that a stray boulder was arcing in her direction.
She barely had time to consider throwing herself from the saddle when another shape came up from the side.
Kahchi steered his rhino right up against Azula's without even holding his reins, and swung his guan dao staff with two-handed grip to arc the blade just forward of her head. It struck the bottom edge of the boulder and smashed through the lower cap with ease, showering Azula with nothing more than dusty pebbles while the rest of the boulder sailed above her. She nodded her thanks to Kahchi and then they had to spur their rhinos forward.
When they reached the ranch house, they all leaped off their rhinos without even stopping. Yeh-Lu ran up to building's nearest wall, knocked on it once with an armored fist, and then pulled a small ball out of a pouch on his belt. Azula turned away and covered her ears, and sure enough mere seconds later there was a crack that made the air shudder, and when she looked up again the wall was now a welcoming if ragged-edged entrance. The Rough Rhinos raced in ahead of her, Kahchi still standing protectively close, and then they all found themselves in the enemy's makeshift headquarters.
Several of the armored agents were scattered around- some braced against the walls or furniture, some pushing themselves off the floor- and on the far side of the wide room was a row of half a dozen of Azula's imposters all braced in combat-ready horse stances.
Then one of the enemy soldiers shouted, "Princess Azula of the Fire Nation, attack!"
Each of the Victims drew a knife, but instead of using the weapons against themselves, they all readied for thrusting assaults.
Then all inferno broke loose.
Azula only had time to say, "Take the imposters alive!" before one of the soldiers punched a stone out of the dirt floor at her, and she had to throw herself to the side to avoid it. The rest was like a formal dance happening at high speed. Mongke dropped into a low stance and threw out a blaze that sizzled the armor of a soldier who was bouncing stones ineffectively off Yeh-Lu's own blast-shielding who was defending Vachir while he one-after-another shot an arrow at each Victim to pin their hands to the wooden walls and Azula tried to ignore their cries of anguish and ran forward with a flurry of attacks that made the enemy retreat from her flames while Kahchi followed through and sliced around and between the soldiers' armor plates with his guan dao but then one Victim appeared amidst the brawl and Vachir was aimed elsewhere and Azula saw the imposter angling towards Kahchi and Mongke shouted a warning but Azula couldn't burn this woman who moved like Mianju and Kahchi tried to bring his staff in line even as the knife plunged into his chest but then Yeh-Lu tackled the duplicate with his full weight and Azula growled and punched a fireball into the nearest soldier's face.
And suddenly the fight was over. Kahchi went still while Azula's target screamed inhumanly.
Azula stood in a daze. She watched as Mongke ran over to work on Kahchi's gushing wound, and only noticed out of the corner of her eye when Yeh-Lu rose up off the ground and yanked the last Victim along so that Vachir could nail her hand to the wall like all the others. She supposed she should have been upset about that, but she couldn't find a way to balance it against the knife buried to its hilt between Kahchi's ribs
When she finally looked up from the fallen, she found a new addition to the scene. A man was peeking into the room from a hall that led deeper into the house. His face was lined with age, and covered in gray stubble that terminated in a haphazardly-trimmed bush of chin hair. His eyes were wide, and he gripped the doorway with an intensity that left his knuckles white as bleached bone.
Like warming up before a hearth, Azula found her sense of reality and purpose returning. "Professor Dong Min, I presume."
Meisai gave another look through her spyglass, but it was futile. The dust cloud had drifted to block her view of the battlefield, leaving nothing to observe but the corpses that had been left outside the flying grit. She couldn't even hear the sounds of combat anymore, but at this distance it didn't necessarily mean anything definite. Still, things were likely winding down now, and if Father was right, then no matter what, Azula had found a way to get her hands on this Dong Min guy.
The man who had made her.
Meisai looked over at her own progenitor- her own Father- and found him in his usual spot crouching beside the sleeping imposters. She went over beside him, and looked down at the women. They almost looked like children, but if they were the same age as Azula herself then they too were just barely adults. "How old was I when you first found out about me?"
"First?" Father blinked. "I guess... I guess you were about a year old. I happened to be in port and had some time to myself so I went to visit your mother, and found her holding you, trying to teach you some new words. Then she said you were my daughter, and dropped you in my arms." He gave a wry smile. "Your hair wasn't any longer than it is now."
"Yeah, I've heard that story. And then you visited when you were in our part of the world, and I was always so happy when you found the time to be with me."
Father shifted his crouch to take a seat on the ground and rubbed his knees. "My life was on the seas, and your mother and I couldn't have married. It wasn't because I didn't love you."
Meisai gave a little sound that was half laugh, half snort. "Other way around. I'm trying to say that you kept coming back... really, changed your life as much as you could to be a part of mine. When I needed someplace to hide- somewhere that people wouldn't recognize me as an Army deserter, away from the rebels I was running from- I thought of you. I went to you because I knew you would change your life if I needed it. And because I wanted to be around you."
"And then I went behind your back to deal with Long Feng." Father sought her gaze, locking onto her eyes with a pleading expression. "I was only thinking of helping you, and I'm sorry I lied. I really am!"
"I know." Meisai held his stare and nodded. "I know. And that's the thing. I knew you'd upend your life for me, but I didn't realize how that would actually play out. I didn't know you as well as I thought I did. I thought that there was nothing that could make you lie to me, or manipulate me. But when I think about it, I had no reason to believe that. So..." Meisai swallowed, and then continued, "So I forgive you. Just like I forgave Azula, and forgave myself. You're my father, and... and I want to fix what we have, but I also don't want you to lie to me anymore. I want to know you and understand you, and I want you to know me and understand me. Just because we weren't together for most of our lives doesn't mean we can't find a way to be close."
Father put his arm around her shoulders, and said, "Aye. I love being a Father more than I love being a Captain. Next time, I'll try to do it the right way."
That's when they heard the approaching stomp of a komodo rhino. Meisai and her Father looked up, the observation post's guards coming to attention around them, as the Yeh-Lu brought his mount to a halt right in front of them. "The battle's over," he intoned from within his armor, "and we've got Dong Min. The Princess wants you to bring the imposters up to the ranch house. And... bring a big blanket. Kahchi didn't make it."
Dong Min's 'office' turned out to be nothing more than another dirt-floor room with weathered walls and exposed rafters. There wasn't even real furniture, just a futon and some dirty sheets bundled up in a corner, and a bunch of empty crates scattered around. In the center of the room, some of the crates had been pressed together and stacked to make something like a desk and chair. Azula couldn't help but notice that amidst the papers and books left atop the 'desk,' there was also a neat pile of sheathed knives.
The same style knives with which the Victims had tried to kill themselves.
The same style knife with which Azula had tried to slit her own throat, when Long Feng's programing had hijacked her body.
Azula felt a stab of fear rip into her heart as the door to the office swung closed behind her. She couldn't help but think that this might be a mistake, meeting alone, nothing but a candle and her Firebending for protection, with the man who had not only wiped out a lifetime of her memories, but also helped Long Feng and Ozai turn her into the world's most reviled fugitive. Could he, with a single word, activate some programming buried deep in her mind and turn her into a living automaton again? Could he bring back the soulless monster who had killed the Earth King and raised a knife to her own throat? Could he just make her whole mind go away, and leave her as nothing more than a menial slave that depended on orders for purpose?
Alone in that room with her creator, Azula realized how very fragile she actually was.
Then Dong Min turned to her from across his makeshift desk, where he had immediately retreated like it was some kind of sanctuary, and spoke in a wavering tone. "I understand that you want to kill me, and you have every reason, but I beg you not to. Please. I'll do whatever it is you want."
And with that, Azula was immediately able to shake off the shackles of her own fears. Dong Min was terrified of her. Even if he had a weapon- literal or figurative- to use against her, she had already defeated such things. She had emerged from her identity of Suki to become Azula once again. She had resisted Long Feng's programmed order to kill herself, had healed the fractures in her own thoughts by journeying within and surviving her own personal chaos. She had overcome her desire to just go away and let the world sort itself out, and emerged now as the leader of the only army trying to truly solve the problems in the colonies. Nothing this man could do was any threat to her.
She was Azula, Princess of Fire.
Azula stood up straight in her armor and examined Dong Min like a spiderfly she had found in her soup. "I think we're a little past the point where your survival is an issue. Let me tell you a bit about your current place in the world. You've been working with Long Feng, a criminal who betrayed both the Earth Kingdom and the Fire Nation for his own personal gain. Specifically, you helped Long Feng provoke me into criminal acts on Kyoshi Island and in the Independent Former Colonies, and programmed me to kill the Earth King. Not to mention, you purposefully undermined the work you had done for the Avatar and the Fire Lord on my mind, and undermined the repairs you had done on the women who called themselves Joo Dee. Was that work why the Earth King hadn't put you death in the first place?"
Dong Min nodded shakily.
"Well. So much for that deal. So in the world's two most powerful nations, you are guilty of treason, and that mandates death. This time, given your lack of reliability, there will be no deals in exchange for your skills." Azula set her candle down hard on the makeshift desk. "But let's say you find a way to live. Maybe here in the colonies, or you could even run for one of the Water Tribes. Perhaps you could even find a way to hide right under the noses of the Fire Lord or the new Earth King." She leaned forward, to stare down at Dong Min like a swooping raptor. "But wait, you already did that, didn't you? And your knowledge made you so dangerous, so desirable, that you were tracked down and enslaved anyway. And that was just when Long Feng and a few others knew of you. Knowledge of your craft has been spreading. So my question to you is... just what makes you think you're going to live more than a year at most no matter what I decide to do with you?"
Silence stretched out to answer Azula's question, until Dong Min let out a sigh that was half sob, and slumped down onto the his crate. Azula stood back up, and couldn't help but feel a little revulsion. This was the man who destroyed and rebuilt her? This was the one with the power of death and creation? Dong Min should have been like a god, but instead, he was barely even a man.
Eventually, he worked up the strength to speak, although he had to fit his words around his quiet whimpering. "I just... I never wanted to do any of it, I just wanted to... go away... once I realized that even the Avatar and the Earth King couldn't resist my knowledge. I wanted to stay far away from everyone! Not just Long Feng! But... I didn't want to die... I didn't... I didn't want them to hurt me... I only started because I thought the knowledge could help people, and... I tried to learn from what they made me... they made me..."
Azula laid a hand down on his head, and waited for him to look up at her. "There comes a point," she said, "where we have to resist our fear, or end up a slave to it."
It was a long time before Dong Min found his voice again. "What are you going to do with me?"
Azula stepped back and crossed her arms. It was time to truly go to work. "Turn you into a weapon, just like everyone else. I want information that I can use to find and kill Long Feng, and wreck his plans. I want to fix The Victims. Uh, the women who you turned into duplicates of me."
"Yes." Dong Min let out a heavy breath. "Yes, I can do that. I know where all the duplicates have been deployed, the ones who still live, and while they will take much work to deprogram, they can be immediately shut down with a control phrase. It will leave them in a stupor, and then they will follow any command addressing them as 'Princess Azula of the Fire Nation.' That's not a manifestation of their identity, that's just the control key. Long Feng specified it."
"And then... can they be fixed?"
"Fixed?"
Azula swallowed. "Can their old selves be restored? To back before Long Feng turned them into me?"
"Oh. Oh, you think they can just be..." He shook his head. "Long Feng killed all those women. Twice, actually. He killed the women I created under the Earth King's and the Avatar's orders, and he killed the women they were in Ba Sing Se when the Dai Li first arrested them. The brainwashing that removes memories destroys them completely. There might be some echoes of the old identities, like a name or familiarity with a home, but bringing that out will only be destructive to the patients' sanity. If it's possible, it's beyond all the knowledge of either Ba Sing Se University or the Fire Nation's best private researchers. And that's not even getting into the physical restructuring done to their bodies. I don't remember what they used to look like, and I would have known them best. Those women are gone. Gone forever."
Azula had to remind herself to breathe.
So.
That was that.
Dong Min was talking about The Victims, but she knew that he was talking about all his victims. Including her.
The true Princess Azula was dead. Forever.
And she had failed in her vow to truly free The Victims, failed even before she knew they existed. All she could do now was give them a new start, and avenge them. "And Long Feng? What is his plan? Why has he had the imposters siccing their goons on everyone they could find?"
"To turn you into the villain. To make people so afraid of you- and so angry at you- that they'll do anything to get rid of you. Anything, in this case, being giving power to a fugitive who turned Ba Sing Se into a gilded cage. I've heard him rehearsing his speeches. He will present himself as a servant, but it will be in a way that he can draw power to himself."
"Speeches?" This was the first Azula heard of that aspect of Long Feng's plan. He had claimed to her back in his secret cave hideout that he was going to simply hand power over to a coalition of governors and... what were they called... industrialists. Azula figured that to be a lie, but what would speeches have to do with that? "Who is he giving speeches to?"
"Yu Dao. The people gathering there. That's where everyone is meeting to turn the colonies into a nation. He's going to play all sides against each other, and use popular opinion to force them to hand him power. He will be able to control them all."
Azula gave Dong Min a hard look. "I think you'd better start from the beginning. What are Long Feng's full plans, and what does he need to accomplish them?"
That night, Azula dreamed vividly. She was a heron, flying over an ocean, searching for distant shores where she could finally rest. Flying was easy, and even though she felt like she had been in the air for time beyond count, she was not tired. Her wings had the strength to take her as far as she needed.
It was the fire that was causing the problem.
The tips of her wingfeathers were burning, the flames slowly creeping up towards her body. Yet before they could burn her, the feathers would come loose in the wind of her flight to flutter enkindled down to the waters.
As they fell, the feathers screamed with unique voices.
She recognized the scream of Captain Ahou. She recognized Kahchi's deep timber. She recognized the screeches, so like her own, of the Victims. There were more besides, and she was responsible for their cries.
When she awoke the next morning, she knew exactly what had given her such a nightmare. After she had gotten all the intricate details of Long Feng's grand plan from Dong Min, Azula had gone on to ask, "And what about me? Or rather, the duplicates. What was going to happen to them?"
As he had explained everything, Dong Min had calmed, growing more confident in his speech. Azula supposed it was a quality of the way his mind worked. He was so lost when it came to surviving in a complicated world, but when he could focus on information and analysis, he was in his element. In response to her question, he had given a sardonic smile and said, "I think you already know the answer. To solidify his power, Long Feng needs to prove his claims to greatness. He needs to produce your corpse, or if that's unavailable, the corpse of someone who looks just like you."
"Easier said than done. I have an army now. Long Feng's strength is soft."
Dong Min lost his smile, and once again his eyes grew wide. "Don't be so sure of that. The governors are on his leash, and they can give him soldiers. And he's hunting you even now. He dispatched Shingyung to deal with you, and she has a shirshu that can track you by smell. She could arrive any minute, and she's far more dangerous than you can imagine."
Azula had shrugged. "She's just one Waterbender. I'm actually looking forward to our rematch."
"Do not let yourself become overconfident with her. She might just be a Waterbender, but the Fire Nation turned her into a living weapon! She's a master of the combat forms of the Northern Water Tribe, and she has an affinity for her element's healing powers. She can fight well enough to pose a danger to even someone on the Avatar's level, and can immediately repair any of her own wounds. And she's especially dangerous to you."
"Me?"
"She's obsessed with you," Dong Min hissed. "Your lives have more parallels than you will ever know, and when the war ended and details of your... defeat... became public, Shingyung became fixated on you. Both of you were manipulated as children and hardened by abuse, but your father was a master of subtlety compared to what was done to done her. To deal with pain, and the self-loathing she felt as a result, she used you as a symbol."
Azula shook her head. "I don't understand. How am I supposed to figure out what you're talking about if I can't even remember my own childhood?"
Dong Min gave a full-body shudder. "It's better that you don't know. Freeing you of the memories of your father's influence was the foundation of healing your mind, and Shingyung's experiences were far worse. She saw you- before I changed you- as a kindred spirit and someone to admire, but also a way to sublimate her own self-loathing. Her worst responses to the traumas in her childhood have only been encouraged, especially by Long Feng, and she is eager to resolve her relationship with you as violently as possible. Whatever you do, you must not engage her in personal combat!"
Azula began to understand what he was implying, and the fires of her anger stirred in response. "Don't act so high and mighty about this. Not when you helped turn me into Sokka's toy!"
"What?" He shrank back, and his face tightened again. "What do you mean?"
Azula stepped forward and loomed over her maker. "I saw Sokka's notes, back in Long Feng's base. He came up with a character for me to become, his ideal woman who he could take as a lover. I still have feelings for him that I can't get rid of! I push them back and try to forget but they still hurt!"
"You... you think he did that on purpose?" And at that, Dong Min smiled in a way very similar to Uncle Iroh. "Princess, Sokka is many things, and a very impressive man in his own way, but he completely lacks foresight. I worked with him to refine his ideas, starting from the very earliest stages of your treatment. He wanted to create a Kyoshi Warrior who could fit into the island's history and society, and he wanted to fit you into a role that he thought would make you happy. He fell in love with you completely by accident, and he resisted for as long as possible. As smart as he is, when it comes to interpersonal relationships, he is very much a dolt."
"You're... saying he just... fell in love with a madwoman? A child with no history?"
"You were pitiable, even before I started my work, and your emerging strength and personality captivated him." Dong Min sat up straighter and looked Azula directly in the eyes. "He's the reason you're alive today. He and the Fire Lord saw, the way your mind was crushed by your defeats and the loss of your Firebending, that you would either die or lose your sanity forever. They felt that extreme intervention was required, despite their misgivings, and Sokka devoted all his powers towards coming up with an ideal solution." He sat back on his crate, and his eyes lost focus. "It's like the myth of the sculptor who fell in love with his statue, and then it was turned to a living woman by a Spirit. In creating you, in understanding you down to your deepest level, he fell in love with you as completely as a man possibly can."
Azula couldn't bring herself to move, couldn't even decide how she felt about all of that. She just stood there, stunned, until a dark thought floated up from the depths of her conscious, a truth that hissed from her mouth with a bitter conviction she didn't realize she had within her. "Except the sculptor already had a love for the clay he worked. Sokka felt only revulsion and pity for what I had been. A sculptor shapes the clay, but Sokka and you both destroyed the real Azula, and built a guess at what she would be like with none of her faults or weaknesses. And, curiously enough, your sculpture broke apart and an altogether different woman emerged from the wreckage." She stepped back and growled, "You and Sokka aren't artists. You're vandals of human lives."
Azula immediately turned and stomped from the room, but hesitated at the door. "You have paper in here, ink, and a brush. I'm not letting you out of this room until you've produced a complete list of where all my duplicates have been deployed and instructions on how to deprogram them. Then we'll talk about what I'm going to do- or not do- to you."
She had glanced back at Dong Min to find him staring at her with wide eyes. Instead of shaking or slumping or shifting, he was profoundly still, like a dusty and forgotten statue.
Sneering with disgust, Azula marched out of the room and slammed the door shut behind her.
Meisai and Toru were waiting on the other side, and at the sight of them, Azula's facade had finally broken down. She didn't know what to do or say, but then Meisai- masculine, tough Meisai- stepped forward and wrapped Azula in a hug. "It's okay," she had said. "It's just us three. Take all the time you need."
And Azula did.
Now, though she was haunted by both her nightmare and the previous day's interview, it was time for Azula to confront Dong Min once again and make sure he was giving her what she wanted. Sure enough, when she unlocked his door and stepped into his office, the light of the rising sun streamed past Azula and fell on thick stacks of handwritten notes arranged neatly on the crates he used as a desk.
The light continued to crawl forward as the door swung, and then Azula what else had been left for her. Behind the desk, Dong Min's body swung lazily in the air, suspended from the ground by the sheets of his futon.
They stretched from the rafters to his neck.
It was a somber meeting over breakfast. Azula, the surviving Rough Rhinos, Toru, and Meisai were assembled at a wobbly table in the same where Kahchi had died. A sheet had been nailed over the hole in the wall that Yeh-Lu's bomb had created, and a pot of jook was left simmering over a small fire built right on the dirt floor.
"Before we begin," Azula said, "I want to take a moment to acknowledge Kahchi's loss. He saved my life yesterday, and served the Fire Nation with unquestionable loyalty throughout his career. Some might criticize his desertion after Zuko was crowned, but I have no doubt that it was loyalty that guided him in that decision as well." She didn't say anything about the crimes he was said to have committed before and after the war. Azula didn't have the strength to reconcile that right now.
Mongke nodded heavily. "Thank you, Princess. We'll be lighting the pyre as soon as we're done here."
"Then let's get things started." She looked around at her advisors, and pushed her grief and failures out of her mind. "We have achieved a major objective, despite our losses, and Dong Min has given us several leads that will allow us to make major steps in our wider goals. We can save the women who have been forcibly turned into imposters of me. Mongke, I want you to take temporary command of our army, and visit each of the locations I will supply to rescue my duplicates. You can use a control phrase to make them docile, and then you'll bring them to your steamer for safekeeping. One of you should be able to look after them there until it's time for our rendezvous."
Mongke glanced at the other Rough Rhinos, and then turned back to Azula. "We can do that, but those imposters are all in command of rebel fighters, yeah? Without your face and your blue fire, they won't fall into line so easily."
"True, but we're running out of time. I'm authorizing you to use all necessary force in achieving your objectives, but hopefully you won't have to do much fighting. The rebel commanders we recruited can vouch for us both, and being able to shut down their own 'Princess Azulas' is a good bit of proof. It won't be easy, but it's necessary."
"Then we'll get it done. The Rough Rhinos are all in. But what about you?"
Azula looked to Meisai and Toru, and gave them a small smile. "My friends, if you'll come with me, I need to deal with some unfinished business. Dong Min revealed that Long Feng has dispatched an especially dangerous assassin after me. Rather than let her nip at my heels, I've decided to deal with the problem as soon as possible. And I have a plan to trap her."
Meisai sat up straight in her seat. "I'm with you. And Daddy is, too."
"Aye. If we're talking about that Shingyung gal, I wouldn't mind helping to take her out. She's as nasty as they get."
"Thank you. All of you." Azula stood up, and took a deep breath. "There's a good chance, as we enter the endgame, that something might... happen to keep me from completing the mission. Because of that, I need you all to watch this, so that you can do it yourselves. Bring in the two imposters."
Yeh-Lu and Vachir got up to leave the room, and quickly returned, each dragging along one of The Victims. They were awake now, and struggled against their bonds, but the Rough Rhinos had firm holds on them. Azula looked upon them, and couldn't help but be reminded of the first Victim, poor Mianju. Azula hadn't been able to save her, and even after all this time and growth she had failed with Dong Min and lost a valuable resource. But she was Azula, and no amount of losses would be enough to shake her from her path, now.
All that was left to do here was speak the control phrase that Dong Min had written down. "Less than perfect," Azula enunciated carefully, "is less than acceptable."
The Victims immediately went still, and all signs of stress left their expressions. They simply stood in place, and placed their lives in Azula's hands.
She sighed with relief that it had worked. "Good. Now, we need to discuss the details of our endgame. It's time for our enemies to fall."
TO BE CONTINUED