A/N: The Following is rated A; for anger.
It contains dialog from several episodes in Season 2.
Reader discretion is advised.
Chapter 11 "Welcome to Ba Sing Se"
Spring, year 11 in the reign of Fire-Lord Ozai
The Kaiu wall was unbelievable.
Zuko had seen reports, sketches, firsthand accounts. He had had it described to him by the only man in history to have ever breached it as an enemy combatant.
None of that prepared Zuko for it. Nothing could have. Hearing about it was one thing, seeing it was another matter entirely.
The Kaiu Wall dwarfed mountains.
It stood, looming on the horizon like a grey storm front for days, as the ferry moved northward, steadily growing more and more distinct, more and more tangible.
More and more impossible.
From the age of nine, after his uncle's unexpected failure and his father's ascension, Zuko had been told that this was his destiny. This wall, this city, this war. He had learned the city with much the same dogged persistence as he had learned the sword and the sacred art of bending. Its conquest was the last hurdle, the last real hold out against the dream of Oda; world conquest.
Although, to be fair, the Crane had proven to be a far more formidable opponent than previously expected; the wrath of one of the great Kami notwithstanding.
The ferry ride had grown tense as the wall had appeared on the horizon. As Zuko had predicted, the captain of the boat had not been amused by the loss of his personal foodstuffs. The refugees were treated to a very stern lecture about the burdens of leadership and their proper place in the grand order of things. Threats were made, but the people of earth were a solid bunch and none of them came forward to condemn Jet, Zuko, or the others.
For his part, Zuko was pleased to see someone else on the receiving end of the classic "stony silence" of the earth peasants for a change. He himself had gotten his fill of it during his campaign in Chameleon Bay and from encounters with the less civilized portions of the Fire-Nation Colonies.
The downside was that, for the last three days of the journey, they weren't fed at all.
As Zuko sat meditating, ignoring the hunger pains that he now knew were merely feeble impersonations or real hunger, Jet angrily stalked back and forth and fumed aloud to anyone who would listen about the "arrogance of the samurai." At no point did he attempt to take personal responsibility for their situation, or even show the slightest indication that he might have made a tactical error. That more than anything else made up Zuko's mind.
Jet was an idiot.
Not only was Jet an idiot, but he also gave off the strong impression that he expected to be in charge of any partnership he might make with Zuko.
As if I would let some wakizashi-less PEASANT command me.
Jet's two friends, Smellerbee and Longshot, seemed decent enough however. From what little Zuko had seen of them, and based on the way they carried themselves, he believed them to be competent fighters. Amusingly, Smellerbee had almost started a brawl when Iroh had mentioned that he found the name "unusual for a young man." Smellerbee, who had then revealed that she was, in fact, a girl, threatened to shave off Iroh's eyebrows while he slept. Luckily, Longshot had managed to defuse the situation with the simple expedient of staring at her and holding her hand gently.
Which, of course, made Zuko think of Katara again.
Nobody is quite so beautifully furious as she can be.
Eventually the tributary they traveled on flowed into an underground dock, much like the one they had left in Full Moon Bay. In this case, however, the dock was underneath a mountain, and across, and atop that mountain was the wall; still looming like the end of days and blotting out the sun a scant hour afternoon.
Zuko felt a wave of fury wash over him as he passed under that huge shadow and into the hidden port. This was not how it was supposed to have been. Until his failure, and its subsequent futile quest for the Avatar, he had always envisioned coming to Ba Sing Se; had been encouraged to do so by his tutors. He had imagined and planned a dozen different strategies, but at no point had he envisioned himself entering the city in green, his honor and topknot gone, skulking like a thief.
He took a steadying breath, trying to cool his temper before he burned the ferry to ash.
This HAS to stop. It serves no purpose except to bring me to the brink of madness.
After the ferry had docked and they disembarked, everyone aboard found themselves presented with a choice. The Kaiu wall encompassed the rice lands that fed Ba Sing Se, but the city itself was still somewhat distant, almost three days walk. A person could either travel by foot, or purchase tickets on the city monorail which, while not terribly expensive, were still beyond the means of many of the refugees.
Zuko once again found himself impressed at the earthers who, when confronted with another obstacle, simply squared their shoulders, and got to work. He believed his own people would have done much the same, although they probably would have organized themselves into squads for mutual defense and security on the road. They also would most likely have sworn to return one day and build a better, cheaper, monorail. To crush the current one, and hear the lamentation of their ticket sellers.
Cackling would most likely have ensued.
As Zuko and Iroh moved to sit down to wait for the next train, Jet caught up with them and dragged Zuko aside for his answer while Iroh began to loudly berate a tea-vendor for daring to sell his favorite jasmine tea cold. Zuko attempted courtesy as best as he could and informed Jet that he had no interest in any formal association with him. He left off calling him an idiot though; the city was apparently dangerous enough already, and there as there was no reason to make an enemy of the swordsman.
Jet seemed more surprised than angry, as though the thought that Zuko might refuse had never occurred to him. In the silence of Jet's dumbstruck face Zuko simply bowed and bid him good day.
But as Zuko sat down next to his uncle… he found Jet staring at him, now with naked hatred in his face.
Ash, I must not have been as polite as I had hoped, Zuko mused as his uncle happily slurped his tea.
His steaming hot tea.
"Uncle… did you get a fresh cup of tea?" Zuko said quietly, face blank.
"What, and waste this cup? My funds are not unlimited nephew and…" Iroh prattled on, but Zuko had stopped paying attention.
He caught Jet's eye and the two of them silently stared at each other. Jet's face contorted in rage, his body on the cusp of violence; Zuko scowling, but otherwise entirely indifferent. Jet broke the stare first and stalked away, most likely to find his friends.
"For a wise old man, you can be pretty stupid uncle," Zuko growled quietly.
"…What?" Iroh, whose rambling had passed into a self-congratulatory metaphor comparing tea to battle victories, looked stunned.
"Are you trying to get us killed?" Zuko's gravelly voice dropped to a whisper. "Firebending your tea?"
Iroh's eyes dropped to the still steaming cup in his hands. "Oops?"
/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\
Zuko still admitted himself impressed by the Kaiu wall, but after a few days of city life he was less impressed with nearly everything else Ba Sing Se had to offer.
After a few hours of travel, the monorail had dumped he and Iroh in the lower ring, an impoverished area between the Uchi "inner" wall and the Chukan "middle" wall. While the Uchi separated the rice-lands from the lower ring, the Chukan separated the slums of the lower ring, which contained the vast majority of the city's population, from the well-off financial and artisan middle ring.
Passage through the Chukan was highly regulated, and without the proper papers one could expect to be denied entry to the middle ring without recourse.
Unfortunately, Kaiu Ping and his uncle Mushi didn't have the "proper" papers.
It was only through a combination of Iroh's charm, and Zuko's not insubstantial powers of intimidation, that they managed to find an apartment in the lower ring for rent at an affordable price. The landlord's initial offer had been so astronomical that Zuko had almost snapped and set him on fire. Luckily, he had managed to calm himself before it came to that and managed to merely give the impression that he wanted to set the man on fire. The cowardly ashpile had caved quickly and lowered the rent down to something more reasonable.
Not that it would have mattered much if they both hadn't found jobs.
The ferry ride, the monorail, the down payment on their apartment and the exorbitant bribes that Iroh had had to pay to obtain their paperwork had taxed their finances quite heavily. Dinners began to grow more and more sparse until the end of their second week when Iroh announced that he had finally found a job.
Zuko was unsurprised to find out that it was in a tea shop.
For his part, Zuko had discovered that by standing near the entrance to the Chukan, glowering at everyone and everything, he attracted the attentions of merchants and minor government officials who had business to conduct in the lower ring. The streets were dangerous, and an appeal to a bushi or ronin for "assistance" was common.
It was easy enough work, Zuko simply strode along behind his client and tried to look as fearsome as possible; something he had excelled at since his marring and subsequent banishment. After the mission was accomplished his client would present him with a small "gift," usually a few zeni, for his troubles.
Very rarely did anyone bother them, and in the few instances that they did Zuko's skill with the sword was more than sufficient to end them.
People started to ask for "Ping" by name.
Despite finding sources of revenue, Zuko found himself growing angrier and angrier as time moved on. He would manage to keep a tight rein on his temper all day, then come home to the small one-room apartment he shared with his uncle and nearly explode. Everything seemed to bother him; from the noise on the street outside, to the fact that their spark-rocks kept going missing, to his uncle's incessant cheerfulness, it all lodged itself under his skin like tick-worms, burrowing and niggling. The city itself seemed to wear at him, the local people were miserable, overcrowding was terrible, and food prices were on the rise. All the stresses seemed to bleed their way through his defenses and take root in his heart.
And, as if that wasn't bad enough, there was fucking Jet.
The grass chewing ash-stain of a man had taken to stalking Zuko; turning up in the oddest of places. Zuko would spot him slouched against the wall of an alley outside his uncle's work or sitting at a ramen stand, bowl untouched in front of him. Once Zuko found him watching his apartment from the roof of the building across the street, all the while Jet's hate-filled eyes remained locked on Zuko.
They never spoke, Jet never even approached him, but Zuko knew that he was just waiting, just biding his time until Zuko made a mistake. Slipped up. Exhaled fire when he should have exhaled air.
Zuko would walk the muddy brown streets, half an eye on his client, half looking for Jet, and the cold analytical part of his brain would recite names and information from Fire-Nation intelligence reports. Route "Gold," the main thoroughfare through the western districts, its street wide enough for a rhino-lizard charge. Route "Brass," a secondary path to the main granary of the lower ring (Objective Crimson) that would give greater cover from archer fire. His mind would drift along, remembering the plans, the maps, and nearly four years of his childhood strategy lessons spent in contemplation. Free hours (which were few and far between) were often spent contemplating the city, avenues of attack and methods of garrisoning the lower ring while the upper rings were still under siege. He'd dreamed of it. Dusty, faded, childhood dreams, dreamed of marching down the avenue, the peasants grateful to the Fire-Nation for their liberation from the oppressive regime of the Earth-King.
Every step he took now was another reminder of his failure, his shame, his destiny thwarted by his own intemperance and incompetence.
And worst of all… you MISS her, a voice seemed to say.
…and I miss her. He agreed.
Acknowledging that fact didn't make it better, somehow it made it worse.
That above all galled him; it didn't make sense. His meetings with Katara over the last few years had been sporadic at best. They'd fought, argued, and then, at some point, miraculously, they'd begun to actually enjoy one another's company. He knew he had at least, but often, in the dark of night, when sleep would not come, a small and very vocal part of him still insisted that it had all been a deception on her part, a ruse to gain information that could be used to destroy his people.
After all, it hissed, who could ever care for someone like YOU.
He was in love with her; deeply, stupidly, terribly in love. Of that much he was certain, but by his reckoning he had been for quite some time, since Tohin Wo.
So why should he feel this way now? He had gone longer stretches without seeing her; one would think that he'd be used to it. Did a few weeks of stolen kisses change him so much, make his so weak as to lose control over the slightest disturbance?
He wanted to be angry with her. He wanted to roar, and swear, and fight her. He visualized it often as waited by the gate to the Chukan. He wanted it to be her fault, but no matter what tact he took his aggressive visualizations always devolved into soft sentimental daydreams. The smell of her hair, the warmth of her skin, the fire in her stormy grey-blue eyes.
He would catch himself at it eventually, his face twisting into an even more furious scowl, berating himself silently for his idiocy and his weakness.
Bit by bit, minute by minute, his fury mounted; grains of sand in an hourglass.
The calculating part of him estimated that he had less than a week before he broke down and firebent.
/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\
Zuko was working. Following closely behind some government inspector for one of the many branches of the Earth-Kingdom government, his single eye sweeping the area around him. He'd discovered that you didn't watch for faces or body language in densely packed streets of the lower ring.
You watched for color.
The streets were muddy brown, the buildings slate grey or ruddy red-brown brick. Everyone wore dirt-brown or deep-green, their eyes were dark and usually downcast. The only bright colors in the lower ring were well-dressed outsiders from the city center… or drawn steel.
But suddenly, impossibly, there was a flash of blue.
Without a thought Zuko veered away from his client, making a sharp right turn and lunging through the densely packed people like a barracuda-gull through tuna.
"Can I help you, sir?"
Zuko found himself standing at a stonecutter's stall, staring at a bright blue stone the size of an eye.
It was her blue. The piercing grey-blue of her eyes.
"Sir?" the shopkeeper said with concern.
Zuko managed to rip his eye away from the stone, fixing the little man in place with a stare.
"How much?" he said flatly, his eye immediately falling back to the stone as through by magnetism.
The shopkeeper winced. "I am terribly sorry sir. That pendant is already spoken for."
Zuko didn't even turn back to look at him, he just reached out with his left hand, picked him up, and swung him into his view.
"How. Much," he growled.
"Sir!" the shopkeeper gabbled, his feet dangling in the air, "you don't understand! Blues stones are incredibly rare here in the city. This may be one of the last-"
"I will not ask again, old man."
"I'm already being paid a whole koku for it!"
"I will give you TWO." The words tumbled out of Zuko's mouth before his brain could even try to stop them.
That's everything I have LEFT, the rational part of his brain screamed at him. But he'd already spoken, and he knew that even if he had had the chance he wouldn't take it back.
He pressed the smattering of silver bu and copper zeni, the entire contents of his coin purse into the merchant's hand before either of them could change their minds.
His change was a single zeni.
His client was gone. Whether dead in a ditch, or safe at his destination, Zuko neither knew nor cared. He had placed the stone in his now empty money pouch but couldn't seem to go more than a few paces without handling it or pulling it out to look at it.
It was like his rage just bled away into it, like she was there soothing him with her simple presence.
Ash and bone, I am a sentimental FOOL.
It was too late in the day to try and find another client, the gates of the Chukan closed at sundown, and so Zuko decided to head to Iroh's workplace instead. He'd need to tell his uncle not to order food for him tonight, and he sensed an argument in his future. Iroh would insist that he could afford to pay for Zuko. Zuko would refuse his charity.
Shouting would ensue.
Zuko's internal contemplation of the oncoming argument came to a screeching halt as he turned onto the street which contained "Pao's Potions" and heard shouting. The front door had been kicked off its hinges and as Zuko stepped through the threshold he caught sight of Jet, his hook-swords out, advancing on Iroh.
Two of Pao's regulars were members of the town watch, a slovenly fat man and his skinny partner, both of whom were on their feet trying futilely to de-escalate the situation. It the few times Zuko had visited his uncle there he found them both remarkably familiar for some reason.
"Drop the swords boy. Nice and easy," the fat one said.
"He's a firebender! You gotta to believe me!" Jet shouted, a look of manic rage on his face.
Shit.
Zuko glanced past Jet to his uncle but was met with a surreptitious shake of his head. Zuko had already shouted at Iroh expansively about firebending in the city and he had sworn to do so only if his life was truly in jeopardy.
Thank the ancestors for this stupid stone. I'd have probably just lit this fool on fire and damn the consequences without it.
"You gotta to defend yerself," Jet sneered as he ignored the watchmen and continued to advance on Iroh. "Go ahead, show 'em what you can do."
Zuko said nothing, simply drew his katana, sloppily, allowing the metal to ring out across the tension of the tea shop and alert Jet to his presence.
Jet looked over his shoulder, face livid. "Where there's one elephant-rat, there's always more," he spat and then flew at Zuko, hook-swords spinning.
A good hook-sword wielder was a versatile and troublesome opponent and, as it turned out, Jet was very was surprised to find that, in practice and form, it immediately resembled air style. Constantly circling, never ceasing, rotational patterns. True it would have had to have been a particularly aggressive version of air style, but it was air style all the same.
The hook-swords' greatest strength was in versatility. Bladed hand guards and pommels made for dangerous close-range fighting. The hooks at the end of the blades allowed a skilled user to link his swords together for an almost whip-like attack at long range. And, of course, they were still swords; sharp and deadlyin the middle distance.
Jet flew at Zuko like a wall of spinning steel, blades crossing, flashing, spinning rhythmically in whirling circles. For himself, Zuko favored an economy of motion, gradually giving ground, refusing to be distracted by the seemingly chaotic patterns the blades carved in the air or by how forcefully he was reminded of fighting the Avatar.
Watch the eyes, watch the shoulders, watch the hips. That's where the attacks come from.
Jet continued to press his assault, and Zuko continued to fall back slowly, step by step, out into the streets and away from his uncle.
"You must be gettin' tired of using that sword," Jet said, leering at Zuko over their crossed blades. "Why don't you just go 'head and firebend at me?"
This idiot thinks he's winning, Zuko thought, slightly amused despite how very annoyed he was.
"Please son, you're confused! You don't know what you're doing!" Iroh called from the door of the tea shop, wringing his apron.
Good. Uncle gets it.
Every fight was part of a larger battle. Every battle was a part of a larger war. Certainly, Jet was driving Zuko backwards. He had driven him all the way outside. Into the street.
Towards witnesses.
Nobody who saw the two of them fighting could think that Zuko was a firebender, a group of people well known for their aggression.
Zuko's only deviation from defense came after he had analyzed Jet's style enough to discern a potential weakness. Whenever the fool swung low with his dominant hand, at the area between Zuko's knee and foot, it was actually a feint, designed to lock an opponent in place and then strike at them with the sword-linking long-range attack.
Zuko bided his time until it happened again and, timing it just right, struck at the sword Jet no longer had a hand on. It decoupled from the first sword and went flying off to the side, while Zuko continued his forward motion and drove Jet away from it, managing to actually cut the stupid piece of grass the Jet continued to chew on while he backflipped away.
That accomplished Zuko returned to passive defense, almost earth style in form and purpose. The level of danger Jet presented had diminished to nearly nothing in the absence of a second sword.
"You see THAT!?" Jet shouted in a carrying voice. "The Fire-Nation is trying to silence me! It'll never happen."
Yeah yeah, keep it up, idiot. Half the district is here by now and you look like a complete fool.
The most difficult part at this point became NOT killing Jet. Without his second sword, the fool was significantly more vulnerable and it took a force of will for Zuko to not let his muscle memory simply spit Jet like a hippo-cow kabob. While Zuko thought he would enjoy his death a great deal, considering the stress the pile of filth had caused him, he judged it a bad move strategic maneuver. Deaths tended to cause a lot of extra work for the town watch and, as of late, the watchmen had become helpful in directing potential clients his way.
They can just arrest him, or at the very least keep him the fuck away from me.
As the duel continued Jet grew more and more frantic and ranted more and more about the Fire-Nation, beginning to sound truly deranged. Zuko remained silent and solidly on defense, which had the effect of making Jet become more and more unhinged. The crowd surrounding the two of them had grown enormous, and not one of them looked like they thought Zuko was a firebender.
Where in the ashpits are the rest of the damned town-watch? How much longer do I have to-
"Everyone, STAND DOWN," a voice rang out.
The town-watch had NOT arrived.
The Dai Li, however, had.
Zuko had only seen a few Dai Li officers before, they weren't the type to hire anyone for protection. What he did know of them he had overheard in taverns, inns and his uncle's teashop where people only spoke of them in whispers. They made people disappear, the could hide in a shadow at noon, they could read minds. Every tale was more and more ridiculous; but the simple widely accepted fact was that it didn't matter if you were a samurai, a ronin, a high-born lord or a peasant…
You did not fuck with the Dai Li.
Zuko, in deference to this piece of information, took a balanced step backward, sheathed his sword in a quick and fluid motion, then bowed moderately to the agents of the Grand Secretariat.
Well. I guess this takes care of THAT problem.
"Arrest 'em, they're firebenders!" Jet shouted proudly. Completely unaware of the situation he was in until the crowd around him began to boo.
"This poor boy is just confused," Iroh said. "We're just simple refugees."
"Liar!" Jet screamed, starting to become even more unhinged.
"This young man wrecked my tea shop and assaulted my employee!" Pao shouted.
"It's true sir, we saw the whole thing," the portly watchman, who had done nothing to stop the fight, reported. "This crazy kid attacked the finest tea maker in the city."
Spirits. WHERE do I know him from? Zuko thought eyeing the man as Iroh blushed like a schoolgirl at the compliment.
"Come with us son," one of the Dai Li said, placing his hand on Jet's shoulder.
Jet took this opportunity to prove he was crazy and tried to attack them.
An act which went over rather poorly for him.
How did I actually even CONSIDER working with that idiot? Zuko thought shaking his head as Jet was dragged away, limbs bound in stone shackles, still cursing and shouting.
"Good work there, Mr. Ronin," one of the two watchmen said sidling up to Zuko. "Glad that got resolved easily!"
Zuko nodded, doing his best to keep his face from bending into a scowl at the man's laziness.
"C'mon Lee," he shouted to his partner, "I think it's about time for something stronger than tea!"
…Lee? Zuko wondered, his memories coagulating in his brain. NO. There are a million Lees… this can't be…
"Spit and Stones, Hong. We're still on duty," the thinner watchman said, not at all disapprovingly.
Ash and bone. They were at Shiro Yoritomo. The flaming public urinator!
Zuko watched them amble away down the dirty streets as the crowd dispersed.
Ancestors, I HATE this city.
A/N: Behold another Sunday, another Chapter! Despite all the trials and tribulations (reads as college and a part-time job) I am once again successful at bringing you all some words; conveniently placed in a particular order so as to maximize their natural awesomeness. Well, I think they're awesome, but I can't be said to be objective about my own (pauses dramatically) ART. That's where you come in! Like it? Hate it? I want to know! Review or Comment and tell me about it! And for those of you who DO do that, you know who you are, always remember that you are heroes and persons of good taste and DISTINCTION.
META-BITS! (bom bom BOM)
The return of Hong and Lee: I've been trying to figure out a way to get those two back in the action for a while and honestly this is the best I could come up with. For a while, they were part of the squad that captured Iroh back in book 2 but I quickly realized that they would have gotten killed that way. So, they were extracted and transported here to Ba Sing Se. Hurray for cameos that NOBODY but me cared about!
So many emotions!: Things are really rough for our boy here. He's been able to keep busy since "The Chase" but now that he's settled down he's having all sorts of new emotions. Ugghh emotions, am I right? He is missing Katara, but is really annoyed with himself for his lack "honorable stoicism" in that regard. Meanwhile, he is NOT firebending at ALL, is trapped in a city that he used to fantasize about conquering AND is being stalked by a crazy person. Yes, Jet is a crazy person, he probably could have just gotten Zuko arrested by just suggesting he was a firebender to the Dai Li, but he had to go all creeper on him. So Zuko is having the feels, oh so many feels, and life is generally pretty shitty for him.
A word on timing: It may, or may not, be important to note that I think that Team Akodo got to Ba Sing Se some time before the Gaang. Aang and pals had to take the long way around, through the serpents pass and also got lost in the desert. So Zuko will have been in the city a while before they get there.
When will they get there? Will Zuko ever find his lost love again?
Next chapter and Yes.
See you then!
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NEXT WEEK on a very special "Avatar: The Last Dragon"...
Iroh drinks tea! Zuko gets a new job and there is a great deal of panicking.
TUNE IN. Same Zuko time, Same Zuko channel!
Original post date: 21 October 2018
